Letter 166. To Jerome of Stridon: on the origin of the human soul

In a letter to the blessed To Jerome of Stridon (Letter 166) Blessed. Aurelius Augustine aims to find an answer to the question of the origin of the soul, which would correspond to his anti-Pelagian ideas and the doctrine of the inheritance of original sin and the need for infant baptism. The letter consists of 28 chapters. Blzh. Augustine writes that the soul is immortal, incorporeal and not a part of God. She fell into sin of her own free will, from which she can free herself with the help of Divine grace. In the letter, the author refers to the 3rd book of the treatise “On Free Will”, where he already listed 4 theories about the origin of the soul (chapter 7). Blzh. Augustine writes that he cannot understand how original sin is transmitted to infants if a new soul is created for each person (chapter 10). He finds a contradiction between the inevitability of eternal damnation, to which unbaptized infants are doomed, and the absence of sins in their souls (chap. 21, 25). The author hopes to receive from the blzh. Jerome's proof of the creationist theory (chapter 27). Contents Aurelius Augustine. Letter 166. To Jerome of Stridon Abbreviations Sources Literature Aurelius Augustinus. Epistola 166. AD Hieronymum de origine animae hominis Letter 166, addressed to Jerome of Stridon, is one of the type of letters that Augustine himself designated as separate books in his Revisions. He combines it with letter 167; both of these letters were transmitted to Jerome through the Spanish priest and church historian Paulus Orosius in 415. This is how Augustine characterizes this work twelve years later: “I wrote two books to the priest Jerome, who lived in Bethlehem, one about the origin of the human soul, the other about the saying of the Apostle James, “Whoever keeps the whole law and yet sins in one point is guilty of all” (James 2:10), in order to obtain his advice on both issues. In the first book I did not find a solution to the question posed; in the second book I did not remain silent about how, in my opinion, it should be solved, but I still wanted to find out from him whether he approved of it. After praising me for contacting him, he replied that he did not have time to respond. I did not want to publish these books while he was alive, in the hope that he would someday answer them and that they could be published along with his answer. But when he died, I nevertheless published the first book with the purpose of warning its reader that one should not at all find out how the soul is given to a person at birth, or, at least, allow a solution to this most difficult question that would contradict the completely clear provisions of the Catholic faith: according to it, because of original sin, infants are undoubtedly doomed to eternal damnation if they are not reborn in Christ. I published the second book in order to present the correct, in our opinion, solution to the issue discussed in it.” This work begins like this: “Our God, who called us...” (Aug. Retr. 2.45, my translation - P.S.). For Augustine, the question of the origin of the soul remained open throughout his life (O'Daly, 1986; 319–322), and this problem became especially acute during the spread of the Pelagian heresy, whose adherents rejected the effect of original sin and, as a consequence, the need for infant baptism. In Africa, this teaching spread after 410, when refugees from Rome, which suffered from the raid of Alaric’s army, headed to Carthage and other large cities. Among them were Pelagius and his follower Caelestius; the latter acted so persistently, questioning the need for infant baptism, that already in September 411, at a church council in Carthage, he was denied ordination to the priesthood. Among those who were concerned about the emergence of a new doctrine in Africa was Flavius ​​Marcellinus, a high-ranking official sent earlier by Emperor Honorius to Carthage to hold a church council at which the heresy of Donatism was finally banned (Mandouze, 1982; 671–688). Marcellinus asked Augustine to consider the position of Celestius and his opponents; apparently this debate was widely discussed in Carthage. Augustine’s response to Marcellinus’ request was the treatise “On the Punishment of Sins, the Absolution of Sins, and the Baptism of Infants” (late 411 - early 412 1). However, Marcellinus' concerns about Pelagianism did not subside. Very soon he again turns 2 to Augustine; this time he informs him of the criticism 3 to which a passage (Aug. De lib. arb. 3.34) from the third book of the treatise “On Free Will” (completed in 395) was subjected. In it, Augustine allegedly retreated from his stated “neutrality” regarding the four theories about the origin of the soul. We are talking about the following theories (Aug. De lib. arb. 3.59) 4: – Traditionism (souls come from one first soul – the soul of Adam); – creationism (souls are created for each person separately); – the theory according to which souls already created and stored in a certain place are sent into human bodies; – the theory according to which pre-existing souls arbitrarily descend into bodies (the “fallen soul” theory). It was precisely in supporting the latter theory that Augustine was reproached by his critics. The statement that souls fall into bodies after committing a sin - post peccatum (O'Connell, 1987; 121-122) allowed the Pelagians to point out the similarity of Augustine's views with the views of Origen, about whose teachings in Africa they knew quite little 5; the anti-Origen crisis that unfolded at the end of the 4th century. - early 5th century in the East, had almost no effect on church life in Carthage and other African cities. Augustine's response to Marcellinus is contained in letter 143 (412.6), in which he asserts his right to error and doubt, and focuses on the passage of Eccl. 12:7, showing through his exegesis that Scripture itself leaves the question of the origin of the soul open (Aug. Ep. 143. 8–9; ibid.; 118–138). Apparently not satisfied with this answer, Marcellinus turns to Jerome for help. Jerome, in letter 165 7 (412 and later), in turn, lists the same four theories 8 about the origin of the soul that were mentioned by Augustine in On Free Will and his letter 143, adding to them only the theory of the Stoics, Manichaeans and Priscillianists 9, according to which the soul is a part of God. Jerome does not offer a new solution to the problem; he points Marcellinus to his earlier treatise “Apology against the books of Rufinus” (402) and reminds him that very close to him lives a “holy and learned man,” Bishop Augustine, who will certainly be able to help him (Hier. Ep. 165. 1; ibid.; 150–167). Jerome's answer was delivered to Carthage, apparently after the death of Marcellinus in the fall of 413. By this time, Augustine was already fully aware of the danger of Pelagius’s teaching and the significance of the question of the origin of the soul in the context of polemics with him. Augustine writes to Jerome in 415 on the basis that Jerome's preferred theory is creationism. But if during the polemic with Rufinus, a supporter of the teachings of Origen, creationism did not raise much objection, now 10, in the context of increasingly fierce polemics with the Pelagians, who based all their reasoning on the fact that for each person a new soul is created, not burdened by sin and connection with pre-existing souls, the need arose to find truly weighty arguments in favor of this theory. Augustine begins his letter with the traditional salutatio (item 1) and recommends Orosius to Jerome, with whom he transmits his letters to him (item 2). Next, he sets out those provisions about the soul that do not cause him doubt: the soul is immortal, the soul is not a part of God, the soul is incorporeal, the soul fell into sin of its own free will and can be freed from it only with the help of divine grace (pp. 3-5) 11. The question that troubles Augustine is this: When does the soul of an infant incur the guilt that, if it dies unbaptized, it will inevitably suffer eternal damnation (n. 6)? Augustine recalls that in the third book of the treatise “On Free Will” he already listed four theories about the origin of the soul, and emphasizes that then he did not pursue the goal of dwelling on any of them (paragraph 7). He knows that Jerome adheres to the theory of creationism; he also knows that Jerome sent Marcellinus to him for clarification, but cannot yet claim that he shares this point of view (item 8), because he himself needs guidance (item 9). He cannot understand how original sin is transmitted to infants if a new soul is created for each person (item 10). He can answer some of the objections to creationist theory on his own. Some objections are based on the passage of Genesis 2:2 (paragraphs 11-12), others on the question of why God creates the souls of infants if He knows about their imminent death (paragraph 13), others on the conviction that a soul that began its existence in time cannot be immortal, and therefore was created before the beginning of time (paragraph 14), and still others concern the souls of infants conceived in adultery (paragraph 15). However, Augustine is unable to answer the question of why children suffer (paragraph 16); he also does not find an explanation for the fact that people are born with such different mental abilities (paragraph 17). He already discussed the suffering of children in the third book of the treatise “On Free Will,” but then it was important for him to show that God is not responsible for these sufferings (paragraphs 18–19), and in his reasoning he did not take into account infants who died unbaptized (paragraph 20). Augustine has no doubt that they are doomed to eternal damnation, but does not understand where their guilt comes from if their souls were created separately for each (par. 21). The idea that in an infant only the flesh is sinful, and therefore he must be baptized not for the sake of saving the soul, but for the sake of saving the body, seems to Augustine repulsive and contrary to the teaching of the Church and, in particular, St. Cyprian, who introduced the practice of prompt baptism of newborns (n. 22-23); otherwise the dead could also be baptized (paragraph 24). He restates the contradiction between the inevitability of eternal damnation to which unbaptized infants are doomed, and the absence of sins in their souls, which were created separately for each of them (n. 25). He will not be convinced by the passages of Scripture Zechariah 12:1; Ps.32:15; Eccl.12:7 (n. 26). He hopes to receive from Jerome a solid proof of the creationist theory, which will eliminate the need for a detailed consideration of the traditionalist position (paragraph 27). In conclusion, Augustine once again asks Jerome to help him in this difficulty. Whatever theory turns out to be correct, it will not contradict church teaching, according to which infants need liberation from sin through baptism, Augustine is sure of this (paragraph 28). The translation of letter 166 was made according to the critical edition of A. Goldbacher. The translator took into account the translations of the letter into English by V. Parsons and R.J. Teske. master's student at the University of Cologne Aurelius Augustine. Letter 166. To Jerome of Stridon 12 On the origin of the human soul 1. To our God, who “called” us “to his kingdom and glory” (1 Thess. 2:12), I asked and ask that, according to His will, it would be useful to both of us what I am writing to you, my holy brother Jerome, asking you to explain to me what I do not know. Although you are much older than me, 13 I myself turn to you for advice as an old man; However, it does not seem to me that there is an age when it is too late to learn what is appropriate. And even if the elders should rather teach than learn, they should still learn rather than be ignorant of what they teach. In all my difficulties that I experience in these most complex issues, I endure nothing as hard as your absence and the distance between us, dear friend. It’s hard for me to send my letters and receive yours: it takes not days, not months, but years. If it were possible, I would like you to be near me every day; I would discuss everything I want with you. And yet I could not give up what was in my power to do, even if I could not do everything I wanted. 2. A pious young man came to me, a brother in the bosom of the Catholic Church, a son in age, a fellow minister in rank - our Orosius. His vigilant mind, his warlike eloquence, his ardent determination, and his desire to be a useful vessel in the house of the Lord 14 are entirely directed toward destroying the false and dangerous doctrines which pierce the souls of the Spaniards much more fiercely than the barbarous sword pierces their bodies 15 . From there, from the very shore of the ocean, he hurried to me, inspired by the rumor that he could hear from me everything about what interested him. His visit was not fruitful: firstly, he learned that he should not believe much of what they say about me; secondly, I taught him everything I know, pointed out where he could learn about what I don’t know, and strongly advised him to come to you. Since he accepted my advice, or rather instruction, willingly and obediently, I asked him that, returning from you, he would choose a return route that would pass through our region. He promised me this, and I think that the Lord himself has given me the opportunity to write to you about what I want to know from you. After all, I was looking for someone whom I could send to you, but I did not come across a person distinguished by reliable behavior, willingness to obey, and experience in travel. When I met this young man, I could not doubt that he was the one for whom I asked the Lord. 3. So accept what I want to clarify for yourself, and do not refuse to think about it. The question of the soul worries many, and I admit, I am among them. I will not remain silent about what seems undoubted to me; Then I will add that it still requires clarification for me. The human soul is immortal in some inherent way; but still not completely immortal, like God, about whom it is said that He alone has immortality 16; the deaths of the soul are mentioned many times in Scripture, including in this place: “Let the dead bury their dead” (Matthew 8:22; Luke 9:60). But since the soul, alienated from life in God, dies in such a way that by its nature it does not completely cease to exist, then, finding itself mortal for some reason, it is not unreasonably called immortal. The soul is not part of God. If it were so, then it would be completely unchanged and incorruptible. And if she were like that, she would not change either for the worse or for the better, or would not acquire what was not in her before, or would not cease to have what she had before, this concerns her attachments. There is no need to prove how wrong this is: anyone who turns to himself will admit it. The words of those who want the soul to be a part of God 17 are meaningless: they say that this filth and baseness that we see in insignificant people, this, finally, weakness and sickness that we feel in all people, does not come from it, but from the body. But does it matter where her weakness comes from? There would be no weakness if the soul were unchanged. For that which is unchangeable and incorruptible cannot be changed or damaged by the influence of anything; otherwise, not only Achilles, as the myths tell, would be invulnerable, but also all flesh, provided that there is nothing that could harm it 18. Thus, a nature cannot be considered unchangeable if it is in any way, for any reason, and to any extent changeable. But it is impermissible to believe that God, who is truly and completely unchangeable, can be anything else. So the soul is not a part of God. 4. Although it is difficult to convince the slow-witted that the soul is incorporeal, I myself am convinced of it. But in order not to start unnecessary disputes about words and not to suffer deservedly in them (after all, if the essence of the subject is clear, there is no point in arguing about its name), I will point out that if the body is any substance, or essence, or that which better designates what exists in some way in itself, then the soul is the body. Likewise, if we call only that nature incorporeal that is extremely unchangeable and remains whole everywhere, then the soul is a body, since it does not possess these qualities. Further, if a body is something that, by its length, width and height, is located or moves in space in such a way that its larger part occupies a larger space, its smaller part a smaller one, and whose part is smaller than the whole, then the soul is not a body. For it extends throughout the whole body which it animates, not through spatial extension, but through a certain life-giving tension; it is present entirely in all particles of the body at the same time and does not appear to be smaller in smaller parts and larger in larger ones, but in one place it is more tense, and in another it is more relaxed; it remains whole in all parts of the body at once and in each separately. In the same way, it completely feels what it does not feel in the whole body: if you easily prick any part of living flesh, then the soul will fully know about it, although this place is not only not on the whole body, but is barely noticeable on it, and throughout the body what is felt will not spread, but will be felt only at the place of the injection. Could there be any other reason why the whole soul perceives entirely what does not happen in the whole body than the fact that it is wholly present where something happens, and does not leave all the other parts in order to be wholly there? These other parts are alive; the soul is present even where nothing of the kind has happened. If something like this happened, and happened simultaneously in two places, then the whole soul would be equally aware of both. Consequently, the soul could not be whole at the same time in all parts of the body and in each separately, if it were distributed throughout them in the same way as bodies located in space, which with their smaller parts occupy smaller places, and with their larger parts occupy larger ones. Therefore, if it is necessary to say that the soul is a body, then this should be done with the proviso that it is not an earthly body and not consisting of water, or air, or ether. Bodies of this kind become larger in larger places and smaller in smaller ones, and none of them is present entirely in any part; but since there are parts in space, they occupy them with parts of their bodies. Therefore it is clear, and it does not matter whether the soul should be called body or incorporeal, that it has its own special nature, created from a more perfect substance than all those elements that make up the earthly mass. This nature cannot be conceived in bodily images that we perceive with the carnal senses; it can be understood with the mind and felt in its life manifestations. I am talking about things that you know, not at all in order to teach you anything, but to show what seems to me to be completely definite in relation to the soul. So, when I get to the points about which I wanted to ask you, I cannot be accused of not having any knowledge or beliefs about the soul. 5. I am sure that the soul fell into sin not through the fault of God or because of any need of Him, but of its own will. And she cannot free herself from the body of this death 19 neither by the strength of her will (as if that were enough!), nor by the death of her body, but only by the grace of God through Jesus Christ our Lord 20 . And in general there is no soul in the human race that could be freed without a mediator between God and people, the man Christ Jesus 21. Whatever its age, every soul that departs from the body, without the grace of the Mediator and His sacraments, is doomed to punishment and at the Last Judgment will receive its body back for its fulfillment. But if at the end of the existence of the human race, which was created from Adam, the soul is reborn in Christ and becomes part of His assembly, it will find peace after bodily death and will receive its body back to its glory. These are truths about the soul of which I am fully convinced. 6. Now accept, I ask you, what I want to learn from you, and do not despise me; and may not he despise you, who for our sake deigned to become despised. My question is this: when does a soul incur guilt, due to which even the soul of a prematurely deceased baby is doomed to eternal damnation, unless the grace of Christ descends on it through the sacrament of baptism, which is also given to small children? You are not one of those who began to chatter about some new teachings, that there is no guilt inherited from Adam, which is removed from the baby through baptism. If I had known that you shared such ideas, or rather, if I had not known that you did not share them, I would never have asked you about it or thought about asking you about it. But I believe that your opinion about this coincides with the most reliable Catholic faith, on the basis of which you cited evidence from the book of Job when you refuted the idle talk of Jovinian 22: “No one will be clean before Your face, not even a baby whose life on earth is one day.” 23 And then he added: “We are considered guilty like Adam, who sinned.” 24 And in your interpretation of the Book of the Prophet Jonah 25, you said quite firmly and clearly that the children were forced to fast with good reason - the reason for this was original sin. Therefore, it seems to me quite natural to ask you when the soul incurs this guilt, which it needs to remove from itself even at this age through the sacrament of Christian grace. 7. Several years ago I wrote a book in several parts about free will, which went into many hands and is now in the hands of even more people. In it I presented four versions 26 of how the soul puts on flesh: do all souls come from that one soul that was given to man in the beginning, or are new souls now created for each individual; already existing somewhere, whether they are transferred into bodies by divine will or arbitrarily fall into them from heaven. I intended to consider these versions in such a way that the truth of any of them would not prevent me from speaking out, concentrating all my strength, against those who tried to oppose to God a certain nature with its own evil principle, that is, against the Manichaeans. I had not heard anything about the Priscillianists at that time - however, their wicked chatter differed little from that. I did not name the fifth version, according to which the soul is part of God; You mentioned her in your letter among others, so as not to miss anything when you answered 27 the question of Marcellinus, a man of pious memory, dear to us in Christ’s love. I did not name it because, firstly, it is not about the incarnation of the soul, but about its nature, and secondly, because those whom I opposed think so. I especially tried to separate the sinless and unshakable nature of the Creator from the vices and defilements of creation, since they 28 declare that the very substance of the good God is in that part that was captivated, damaged, suppressed and forced to sin by the substance of evil, to which they attribute its own principle and superiors. So, putting aside this error of the heretics, I wish to know which of the four versions is to be preferred. Whatever it may be, let it not contradict the position of faith in which I am deeply convinced: every soul, even the soul of a newborn baby, needs deliverance from sinful bonds, which is given to it only through Jesus Christ and His crucifixion. 8. In order not to prolong my letter, I will formulate your point of view: you are convinced that to this day God creates a separate soul for each person at birth. Knowing about possible objections (after all, you can, for example, remember that God completed all his creations on the sixth day, and rested on the seventh), you cite evidence from the Gospel: “My Father is working until now” (John 5:17). So you wrote to Marcellinus, and in this letter you most kindly honored me with a mention, indicating to him that he could find me here in Africa and hear from me a simpler explanation of this situation. But if it had been in my power, he would not have asked this of you, knowing how far away you live, especially if he was really in Africa at that time. When he wrote to you, I don’t know; I only know that he was aware of my doubts on this issue and therefore he decided to do without my advice. But even if he had turned to me for help, I would have been even more encouraged to advise him to write to you and would have been grateful for the benefit that your answer could bring to all of us, but you chose to send a short note in response rather than a full explanation. I think that you acted in such a way as not to waste your strength, believing that I know perfectly well what Marcellinus asked you about. But I admit: I would like this point of view to become mine too, but so far this is not the case. 9 . You sent students to me so that I could teach them what I myself do not yet know. Teach me what I need to teach. For many demand that I teach them, but I confess to them that I am ignorant in this, as in many other things. And although they are embarrassed to say this to my face, perhaps they say among themselves: “You are a teacher of Israel and you do not know this?” (John 3:10). The Lord said this to one of those who liked to be called Rabbi, which means “teacher”; Perhaps he came to the true Teacher at night because he was used to teaching and was ashamed to learn. It gives me greater pleasure to listen to a teacher than to be known as a teacher; and again it comes to my mind what He said to those whom He chose from all the others: “You do not allow people to call you Rabbi, for you have only one Teacher - Christ” (Matthew 23:8). No one else taught Moses through Jethro 29 , no one else first taught Cornelius through Peter and then Peter 30 through Paul 31 ; whoever speaks the truth, it is given by the one who himself is the Truth. And if until now we are ignorant of that question and have not been able to find the answer either through prayer, or reading, or meditation, or reasoning, is it not so that we can see with what love we should teach the ignorant and with what humility we should learn from the learned? 10. Please, teach me what I should teach, teach me what opinion I should adhere to, and tell me: if for each individual person at birth a separate soul is created, then when is sin committed in the souls of infants, because of which it becomes necessary for them, sinners in Adam, from whom the sinful flesh 32 came, to have remission of sins in the sacrament of Christ? Or, if their souls do not commit any sin, does the Creator have a just reason to impose on them the sin of another person at the moment when they are united with the mortal members descended from him, as a result of which they are subject to eternal damnation if they do not receive help from the Church, despite the fact that they are not able to receive the grace of baptism on their own? Is there a fair basis for dooming to eternal damnation many thousands of souls who, after the death of infants, leave their bodies without receiving forgiveness through the sacrament of Christ, if each new soul is united with an individual at his birth not because of his past sin, but according to the will of the Creator? He created them to animate human bodies - and He knew that each of them would leave the body, innocently losing the baptism of Christ? But we cannot speak of God as if He forces souls to sin or punishes the innocent, and we cannot deny that those souls who leave their bodies without the sacrament of Christ, even if they are the souls of infants, will inevitably undergo eternal condemnation; and therefore I ask you to explain to me how to defend our position, according to which souls do not come from one soul of the first man, but are created for each person separately, just as that first soul was created. 11. I believe that I can easily refute all other statements against this position, including the one that some people 33 find especially devastating: how could God finish creating all things on the sixth day and rest on the seventh day 34 if we assume that He is still creating new souls? If we repeat to them the testimony that you cited from the Gospel in the above-mentioned letter (“My Father is working until now” 35), they will probably answer: “By working we mean the management of what has already been arranged, and not the creation of new things.” They say this so that there is no contradiction with the book of Genesis, which clearly states that God completed all his creations. For the passage that He rested should be understood in such a way that He rested precisely from the creation of new things, and not from managing them. For then He created what was not before, and from the creation of these things He rested. For He completed everything that He knew should be created even before it began to exist, so that subsequently, whatever He created, He could create and make, not what was not before, but from what already was. Thus, both passages turn out to be true: both when it says: “He rested from his work,” and when it says: “And he works to this day,” for the book of Genesis cannot contradict the Gospel. 12. They say all this so that one cannot think that God now creates new souls in the same way as he once created that one. In their opinion, He creates new souls from the one that already existed, or releases them from some source or storehouse that He then created. This can be easily answered: in those six days God created many things using the materials already created; for example, He created birds and fish from water, and trees, grass and animals from earth. But it is absolutely certain that He then created something that did not exist; for there were no birds, no fish, no trees, no animals, and one can easily understand that He rested after creating those creatures that were not and which were created, that is, He stopped creating what was not. But if we say that He does not release existing souls from some unknown source, that He does not scatter them like particles of Himself, that He does not extract them from that one soul, that He does not put the fetters of the flesh on them because of sins that were committed before their incarnation, but that He creates a new soul for each person at his birth, then this will not mean that He creates something that He did not create before. For already on the sixth day He created man in His own image, that is, He created him in accordance with the rational soul. He does this to this day, not creating what did not exist, but multiplying what did exist. Therefore, it is also true that He rested from the need to create things that did not exist, and that He is still active: He not only controls what He created, but creates in greater quantity what He has already created, and not what He has not yet created. One way or another, we are freed from the objections connected with God's rest from His works, so that there is no reason not to believe that to this day new souls are created not from that one soul - the soul of Adam, but like that first soul. 13. To the question “Why does He create souls for those who will soon die, if He knows about it?” we can answer that in this way the sins of the parents are either revealed or castigated. Also with good reason we can leave this to His care, for we know that He endows the course of all transitory things, among which the birth and death of living beings, with beauty and order; but we cannot understand this, and if we could, we would be consoled by their inexpressible sweetness. It was not in vain that the prophet said about God, filled with divine inspiration: “Who creates the universe in proportion” 36 . Therefore, music, that is, the science of proportionality or its perception, is given by the generosity of God to mortals with a rational soul in order to point them to the great truth. If any songwriter knows with what sounds the rhythm should be endowed, so that thanks to the sounds that either die down or are resumed, the melody flows and develops in the most beautiful way, then God, whose wisdom, with which He created everything, should be above all arts, much less will allow the time periods between the birth and death of His creations - for this world they are like syllables and words, in this amazing song of mortal things - to be shorter or longer than required in advance an invented and predetermined rhythm. And if I can say this about the leaves on a tree or about the hairs on our head, 37 then much more can I say this about the birth and death of a person, whose life is neither shorter nor longer than the duration that, according to the knowledge of God, the manager of times, is consonant with the structure of the universe. 14. There are those who say that everything that begins to exist in time cannot be immortal, for “everything that comes into being is destroyed, and everything that grows grows old” 38 . In this way they try to convince us that the human soul is immortal only because it was created before all times; this, however, will not shake our convictions. If we omit all other objections, I will only mention that in time the immortality of the flesh of Christ began to exist, which “dies no more, and death will no longer have dominion over it” (Rom. 6:9). 15. In your book against Rufinus 39 you also mention other critics of this point of view 40 to whom it seems that it is unworthy of God to give souls to those who were conceived in adultery 41 . From this they try to conclude that it is precisely because of misdeeds committed before life in the flesh that souls are sent to this kind of imprisonment 42 . This does not convince me at all, and I can find many arguments against these slander. You yourself made a brilliant comparison when you answered them that the vice is not in the sown wheat, the harvest of which was stolen, but in the one who stole this harvest, and that it does not follow from this that the earth should not cherish seeds in its bosom if the sower threw them with an unclean hand. But even before I read your answer to them, this criticism concerning the fruits of adultery did not cause me any difficulty, for in general I believe that God does much good even from our vices and our sins. When a reasonable and pious person reflects on the creation of any living creature, he offers inexpressible praise to its Creator; How much praise, then, is worthy of the creation of man! If you ask the question about the reason for their creation, then the fastest and best answer will be the following: every creation of God is good. And what could be more worthy of a good God than the creation of good, which no one but Him can create? 16. This and other things that I can and as best I can, I speak against those who are trying to refute the opinion that souls are created for each individual individually, just as that first soul was created. But when it comes to the suffering of babies, believe me, I find myself in great difficulty and do not know at all what to answer. And I’m talking not only about those sufferings that entail eternal condemnation after this life: they will inevitably undergo them if they leave their body without the sacrament of Christian grace, but also about those that are revealed to our grieving eyes in this life; if I wanted to list them, I would run out of time faster than examples. They waste away from illness, suffer from pain, are tormented by hunger and thirst, they become crippled, lose sight and hearing, and are tormented by unclean spirits. There must be some explanation why they, having done nothing wrong, suffer all this justly. It cannot be said that this happens without the knowledge of God, or that He cannot prevent those who do it, or that He Himself unjustly does it or allows it to be done. We can say about irrational animals that they are intended to be used by higher beings, even if vicious: we clearly see in the Gospel 43 that the demons were allowed to use pigs as they wanted. But can we say the same about a person? Man is a rational animal, albeit a mortal one. In its members is a rational soul that atones for guilt through such intense suffering. God is good, God is just, God is omnipotent; to deny this would be madness. Therefore, the cause of those misfortunes that befall infants should be considered fair. Of course, when adults suffer, we usually say that in this way either virtue is tested, as in the case of Job, or sins are punished, as in the case of Herod; The Lord showed us several similar examples so that we could guess what is hidden for us. But all these examples concern adults. Explain what to answer about children if they have no sins that should be punished by such suffering, and there is no righteousness at their age that should be experienced 44 . 17. What should I say about differences in mental abilities? In young children this difference is hidden, but in adults it manifests itself as a consequence of different natural inclinations. Some are so slow and forgetful that they cannot even learn the basics of a language, and some are so stupid that they are little different from cattle; they are popularly called fools. Maybe in response I will hear that the reason for this is their bodies. But is it consistent with the position that we want to defend that the soul chose a body for itself and made a mistake, being deceived in its choice? Or that the soul, forced by the very fact of its birth to enter the body, did not find another body for itself, since crowds of souls had already preceded it, and, as happens in a theater with a place in the auditorium, it occupied the flesh that it could occupy, and not what it wanted? Can we really say this and should we think like this? Teach us what we must think, what we must speak, so that the theory of new souls created for individual bodies separately may be convincing to us. 18. Not about the mental abilities of children, but about the suffering that they endure in this life, and I said something in my essay “On Free Will.” I will tell you what exactly I said and why this is not enough for me to answer the question that we are now discussing, and in this letter I will cite that same excerpt from the third book of the treatise. Here it is: “A more serious complaint and, one might say, filled with greater mercy, concerns the bodily torment to which children are subjected, who, due to their age, have not committed any sins (unless the souls with which they are animated did not appear before these people themselves). Usually they say this: “What bad did they do to suffer so much?” As if there could be any merit in innocence when there is no opportunity to sin! And since God does something good by correcting adults who are tormented when their beloved children suffer and die, then why shouldn’t this happen? After all, when all this ends, then for those to whom this happened, this will no longer exist, and those for whom this was done will either become better if they, having experienced worldly misfortunes, correct themselves and choose a more righteous life, or will be deprived of forgiveness at the coming Judgment, if they do not want to turn their aspirations from the worries of this life to eternal life. Who knows what good reward God has prepared in His innermost plans for infants, because of whose torment the cruelty of adults is humbled, their faith is tested and mercy is shown? Who knows what good reward God has prepared for them, if, although they did not do anything righteous, they still did not sin in anything and endured it all? Therefore, it is not without reason that the Church venerates as holy martyrs those infants 45 who were killed at the time when Herod ordered to find and kill our Lord Jesus Christ” 46. 19. I said this when I wanted to reinforce the very point of view that is now being discussed. And as I mentioned above, I tried to show that regardless of which of the four opinions about the incarnation of the soul is true, the immaculate nature of the Creator has absolutely nothing to do with our sins. And so then it didn’t matter to me which of these opinions could actually be refuted and discarded. After all, no matter which of the opinions about the soul prevailed over the others, I, having thought them over more and more carefully, could be completely calm, for I showed that for all opinions what I spoke about remains irrefutable. But now I want, if possible, to choose one correct point of view on the incarnation of the soul, and therefore, upon careful examination, my argument (which I cited from my book) no longer seems convincing and thorough enough to me in defense of the version discussed in this letter. 20. For the rationale for that version was what I wrote above: “Who knows what good reward God has prepared in His hidden plans for infants, because of whose torment the cruelty of adults is humbled, their faith is tested and mercy is shown? Who knows what good reward God has prepared for them, if, although they did not do anything righteous, they still did not sin in anything and endured it all? But I understand that on good grounds this can be said either about those who endure such things for the name of Christ and the true faith, even if they do not know about it, or about those who are already invested with the sacrament of Christ, for without communion with the one Mediator they cannot be freed from eternal condemnation; in this way they can receive reward for all the evil that they suffered in various worldly misfortunes. But now our difficulty cannot be resolved unless we answer the question about those babies who die after the most terrible suffering without being introduced to the Christian sacrament: what reward can we imagine for them if, in addition to everything, eternal damnation awaits them? I answered the question about infant baptism in the same book, albeit incompletely, but still to the extent that seemed to me suitable for this treatise; Those thoughts of mine are useful to those who are little versed in faith or have not yet acquired it. But then I did not think that something should be said about the eternal condemnation of those babies who pass away without baptism, because then we were not talking about what is being discussed now. 21. But even if we omit and ignore those sufferings that do not last long and, having ended, do not repeat again, can we really ignore this in the same way: “Death through one man, and through one man the resurrection of the dead. Just as in Adam all die, so in Christ all will be resurrected” (1 Cor. 15:21–22)? From this divine and clear statement of the Apostle it is sufficiently evident that no one enters into death except through Adam, and no one enters into eternal life except through Christ. That is why everything and everyone is used here, for just as all people through the first, that is, bodily, birth belong to Adam, so all people who come to Christ come to the second, that is, spiritual, birth. Everything is said here, and everything there, because just as everyone dies only in Adam, so everyone who is resurrected will rise only in Christ. And therefore, anyone who would say that anyone would be raised at the resurrection of the dead in any other way than in Christ should be hated as a plague to our common faith. Likewise, anyone who says that infants who have passed away without participating in His sacrament will be resurrected in Christ will definitely go against the apostolic prophecy and condemn the entire Church, in which they are in such a hurry to baptize infants precisely because they unconditionally believe that otherwise they will not be able to rise in Christ. It remains for us to conclude that those who have not been resurrected in Christ are in eternal damnation, as the Apostle says: “By one transgression there is condemnation for all men” (Rom. 5:18). And the whole Church believes that infants are born guilty of this crime, and you yourself established this with the deepest conviction, as I already mentioned above, in your treatise against Jovinian and in your interpretation of the prophet Jonah (and, I think, in your other writings, which I have not read or which I could not now remember). So, I seek the reason for this condemnation to which infants are condemned, for if new separate souls are created for separate people, I do not see any sin in souls at this age, and I do not believe that God will subject a soul to eternal damnation in which He sees no sin. 22. Should we argue that in a baby only the flesh is sinful, 47 and a new soul is created for him, and that his soul, living in accordance with the commandments of God, with the help of the grace of Christ can earn incorruptibility even for his bridled and subjugated flesh? Or we must say the following: since in an infant the soul cannot yet act in this way, if it receives the sacrament of Christ, it acquires for its flesh with the help of this grace what it has not yet been able to obtain thanks to its morals and actions; If the soul of a baby dies without that sacrament, then it itself will find itself in eternal life, from which no sin could separate it, and its flesh will not be resurrected in Christ, because it did not accept His sacrament before death? 23. I had never heard or read anything about this version, but I certainly heard and “believed, and therefore said” (Ps. 115:1) that “the time will come in which all who are in the graves will hear His voice, and those who have done good will come forth to the resurrection of life” (John 5:28–29); this is the resurrection about which it is said: “and through one man the resurrection of the dead” (1 Cor. 15:21), this is the resurrection when “in Christ all will rise” (1 Cor. 15:22), and “those who have done evil will enter into the resurrection of judgment” (John 5:29). But what should we think about those babies who left their bodies without baptism, without having time to do either good or evil? The passages I cited say nothing about them. But if their flesh does not resurrect because they have committed neither good nor evil, then the flesh of those who, having received the grace of baptism, died at an age at which they could not yet commit either good or evil, will not resurrect. If the latter will be resurrected together with the saints, that is, together with those who did good, then with whom will the first be resurrected, if not with those who did evil? Otherwise we will have to think that some human souls will not receive their bodies back either in the resurrection of life or in the resurrection of condemnation, and this thought seems repulsive in its very novelty, even before you begin to expose it. And then, who can stand it if people who run to baptize their babies think that they are doing this not for the sake of their souls, but for the sake of their flesh? Saint Cyprian did not introduce new provisions, but consolidated the foundations of the church faith in order to correct those who believed that a baby should not be baptized until the eighth day from his birth, when he said 48 that it is not the flesh that should perish, but the soul. Together with some other bishops, he ruled that a child could rightfully be baptized immediately after birth. 24. Let anyone who has not understood what he needed to understand in any of Cyprian’s works think what he pleases; but no one should have any objection to the absolutely clear statement of the Apostle, who proclaims that because of the crime of one, all are subject to eternal condemnation, and that only God's grace through our Lord Jesus Christ frees from this condemnation - in Him alone all who are resurrected will be resurrected. No one should speak out against the deeply rooted church tradition, for if the rush to baptize infants is only needed to save their bodies, then the dead can also be baptized. 25. Since this is so, it is necessary to find and give a reason why souls are subject to eternal condemnation, which are created new for each individual person who is born, when infants die without the sacrament of Christ. The fact that they are subject to eternal condemnation if they leave their body in this way is testified by the Holy Scriptures and the Holy Church. Therefore, let it be my opinion that a new soul is created for each person, if it does not contradict the completely clear statement of the Apostle, and if it contradicts him, then let this opinion not be yours. 26. I do not want to be told that the following Scriptures must be used to support this opinion: “Who formed the spirit of man within him” (Zech. 12:1) and “Who formed their hearts separately” (Ps. 32:15). Something extremely weighty and undeniable is needed that would not force us to think that God condemns innocent souls to eternal damnation. “Create” has the same or even stronger meaning than “form,” but it still says: “Create in me a clean heart, O God” (Ps. 50:12). It does not follow that in this passage the soul desires to be created before it has any existence. For it is created, already existing, by the acquisition of righteousness, and it is formed, already existing, by the correct idea of ​​\u200b\u200bthe doctrine. What is said in the book of Ecclesiastes ("Then the dust will be turned into earth, as it was; and the spirit will return to God who gave it" (Eccl. 12:7), does not confirm the opinion that we want to share; moreover, this passage confirms another opinion, according to which all souls came from one soul. According to the adherents of this opinion, the dust turns into the earth which it originally was, and the body of which this passage speaks returns, not to the man from which it came, but to the earth from which the first man was created, and likewise the spirit, which came from the spirit of that one man, returns not to him, but to the Lord who gave it to that man. And since this testimony from Scripture confirms the opinion of those people, and yet does not seem entirely contrary to the opinion which I wish to defend, I thought that Thy Righteousness should be warned not to attempt to deliver me from these difficulties by such testimony. One's desire alone cannot make an untruth true, but if it were possible, I would want this opinion to turn out to be true, just as I want you to bring weighty and indisputable evidence in its defense if it is true. 27. The same difficulty haunts those who believe that God sends souls into bodies that already exist somewhere and have been prepared for this from the beginning of divine creation. For they can be asked the same question: if immaculate souls obediently go where they are sent, then why are they punished as infants if they end their lives unbaptized? We see exactly the same difficulty in both versions. Those who insist that individual souls end up in separate bodies because of their misdeeds in a previous life seem to find it easier to find a solution to this issue. They believe that to die in Adam is to suffer punishment in the flesh, which came from Adam; both children and adults, according to them, are freed from this guilt by the grace of Christ. It is true, truly, wonderful that the grace of Christ frees both children and adults from sinful guilt. But I do not believe, I do not admit, I do not agree that in another, previous life 49 souls sin and because of this they are cast into the prisons of the flesh. Firstly, I don’t know how one can imagine anything more terrible than the fact that countless times over countless centuries, souls have to return again and again to the burden of a corruptible body and suffer punishment 50 . Secondly, if they speak the truth, then who dies so righteous that there is no need to worry lest he, having sinned in the bosom of Abraham, be cast into the flames of that rich man 51? Why can't he sin after leaving his body if he could sin before he entered this body? Finally, to sin in Adam (as the Apostle says, “in whom all have sinned” 52) and to sin somewhere outside of Adam and thereby end up in Adam, that is, in the flesh that came from Adam, as in prison, are completely different things. I do not want to discuss the version according to which all souls come from one soul, unless it is necessary; If the version discussed in this letter is true, how I would like you to defend it so that it is no longer necessary to discuss the others! 28. I wish, I ask, I offer fervent prayers with the hope that through you the Lord will remove my ignorance in this matter; but if I turn out to be unworthy of this (may it not be so!), then I will ask for patience from the Lord our God, faith in whom does not allow us to murmur against Him when He does not answer our knock. Let us remember what was said to the Apostles themselves: “I have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now” (John 16:12). As for me, I will relate my question to these things and, realizing this, I will not be annoyed at the fact that I turned out to be unworthy, so as not to turn out to be even more unworthy because of this. I don’t know much else either - I can’t mention and list everything; and I would calmly continue to be ignorant of this if I were not afraid that one of the versions of the incarnation of the soul might contradict what we hold with unshakable faith and penetrate defenseless minds. 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Beatrice, P. F. 2013. The Transmission of Sin; Augustine and the Pre-Augustinian Sources. Trans. from the Italian by A. Kamesar. Oxford; Oxford University Press. Bouteneff, P. C. 2008. Beginnings; Ancient Christian Readings of the Biblical Creation Narratives. Grand Rapids (MI); Baker Academic. Brown, P. 2000. Augustine of Hippo; A Biography. Berkeley, Los Angeles; University of California Press. Chadwick, H. 1976. Priscillian of Avila; The Occult and the Charismatic in the Early Church. Oxford; Clarendon Press. Crispus, Gaius Sallustius. 1956. Bellum Iugurthinum [in Latin]. Ed. by E. Malcovati. Torino; Paravia. Furst, A. 2011. Von Origenes und Hieronymus zu Augustinus; Studien zur antiken The-ologiegeschichte [in German]. Berlin; De Gruyter. Hunter, D. G. 2009. Marriage, Celibacy, and Heresy in Ancient Christianity; The Jovinianist Controversy. Oxford; Oxford University Press. Korsunskiy, A.R. 1969. Gotskaya Ispaniya [Gothic Spain]; ocherki sotsial’noekonomicheskoy i politicheskoy istorii [Essays on Social-Economical and Political History] [in Russian]. Moscow [Moscow]; Izdatel'stvo Moskovskogo universiteta. Mandouze, A. 1982. Prosopographie de l’Afrique chretienne (303–533) [in French]. Paris; Editions du center national de la recherche scientifique. O'Connell, R. J. 1987. The Origin of the Soul in St. Augustine's Later Works. New York; Fordham University Press. O'Daly, G.J.P. 1986. “Anima, animus” [in Latin, Ancient Greek, and German]. In vol. 1 of Avgystinvs-Lexikon, ed. by C. Mayer, 315–340. 4 vols. Basel; Schwabe & Co. Rombs, R. J. 2006. Saint Augustine and the Fall of the Soul; Beyond O'Connell and his Critics. Washington; The Catholic University of America Press. Sabatier, P., ed. 1751. [in Latin and Ancient Greek]. Vol. 3 of Bibliorum Sacrorum latinae versioves antiqvae seu Vetus Italica. 3 vols. Paris; Apud Franciscum Didot. Sallyustiy, Gay Krisp. 1981. Yugurtinskaya voyna [Jugurthine War] [in Russian]. In Sochi-neniya, trans. from the Latin by V. O. Gorenshteyn, 40–105. Moscow [Moscow]; Science. Teske, R. J. 2008. To Know God and the Soul; Essays on the Thought of Saint Augustine. Washington; The Catholic University of America Press. On the dating problem, see Rombs 2006:77–81. Marcellinus' letter has not survived; its content is restored from Augustine's answer (Aug. Ep. 143). Apparently, the church council in Carthage did not prevent Celestius from developing the views of his teacher Pelagius, who had meanwhile already left Africa, and forming a circle of his supporters. R.J. O’Connell notes that the formulations of these theories may indicate that they are all the result of the thoughts of Augustine alone (the logic of their identification is completely transparent: first the question is raised whether the soul existed before the incarnation, then whether it carries sin), but the writings of his contemporaries indicate that these formulations were quite generally accepted. In addition to Jerome, they are mentioned by his opponent Rufinus of Aquileia (Ruf. Apol. 6) and Evodius (Mandouze, 1982:366–373; Eu. Ep. 163) of the Augustinian corpus (O’Connell, 1987:33; Beatrice, Kamesar, 2013:72). Augustine, who undoubtedly received some information from Jerome, became truly acquainted with the teachings of Origen only in 414 thanks to the arrival of Paul Orosius in Hippo. For dating see O'Connell 1987:118; Brown, 2000:354. The number of Jerome's letter is given according to the Augustinian corpus. Unlike Augustine, Jerome names the key figures for each theory. For the theory of the “fallen soul” - this is Pythagoras of Samos, the Platonists and Origen, for traditionalism - Tertullian, Apollinaris of Laodicea and “most of those who live in the West.” Jerome also speaks of “certain churchmen” who “with foolish conviction” believe in the theory according to which created souls reside in a certain container, from where they are then directed by God into bodies (Hier. Ep. 165. 1), but does not name specific names, like Augustine. The main characteristics of the teachings of Priscillian, whose activity dates back to the second half of the 4th century, can be considered the principle of strict asceticism, interest in apocryphal evidence and demonology, specific views on the Trinity, which did not imply the distinction of three Persons within it. Christ was conceived as a divine force present in every creation, in the cosmos as a whole; Christ is the first principle and the first cause, but He Himself has no beginning. The key definition of Christ becomes innascibilis - “one who cannot be born.” Priscillian's contemporaries considered him a Manichaean and a Gnostic, while he himself sharply rejected these teachings, considering himself a member of the Catholic Church (Chadwick, 1976:57-110). He was executed in 385, the first death sentence imposed on a heretic in church history. After Priscillian's death his views continued to spread throughout Spain; in the 6th century the bishops considered it necessary to once again condemn Priscillianism (Korsunsky, 1969:260). Already in 415, a church council was convened in Diospolis, at which the teachings of Pelagius were discussed. Then all charges were dropped against Pelagius, but in 416 his teaching was condemned at the councils of Carthage and Milevis. In 418 it was declared heresy by Pope Zosimos, who, however, soon died, allowing the Pelagians to continue to spread their views (Brown, 2000:340–366). For the arguments that Augustine uses in letter 166 to prove the incorporeality of the soul, see Teske, 2008:197–215. © Philosophy. Journal of the Higher School of Economics. Translation: © P. N. Semenova. Original: Augustinus. Epistula 166 // Sancti Aureli Augustini Hipponensis episcopi epistulae / hrsg. von A. Goldbacher. – Wien, Leipzig; Tempsky-Freytag, 1904. – S. 545–585. – (Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum; 44). The actual age difference between Jerome and Augustine was about seven years. In 409, the Vandals, Alans and Sueves invaded Spain (Augustine, Teske, Letters 156–210:79). It can be assumed that Augustine describes the situation in Spain from the words of an eyewitness, Orosius (cf. Oros. Ad Aug. 1: “Dilacerati grauius a doctoribus prauis quam a cruentissimis hostibus sumus”). Augustine gives a similar reasoning in Aug. Contra Sec. 2.9. Hier. Adu. louin. 2.2. The monk Jovinian criticized asceticism, arguing that celibacy and fasting in the eyes of God are no more valuable than living in marriage and eating food without any restrictions, but full of gratitude to God. In his opinion, all baptized Christians will receive the same reward in heaven, regardless of whether they led an ascetic lifestyle or not. Jovinian was declared a heretic at the councils of Rome and Milan (390). Jerome's treatise is the main source from which one can reconstruct the positions put forward by Jovinian. A comprehensive analysis of his teachings is contained in Hunter, 2009. Aug. De lib. arb. 3.59, 3.62, 3.63. Hier. Ep. 165 in the Augustinian building. Augustine continues to talk about the Manichaeans. Augustine explains the contradiction between Gen. 2:2 and John 5:17 also in Aug. De gen. 4, 11–12, which he began work on around this time (O'Connell, 1987:156). In the indicated chapters of the treatise there is no mention of any opponents of Augustine, polemics with whom would force him to pay attention to this issue. Perhaps in this passage Augustine introduces fictitious opponents: thus he supports Jerome, who brought biblical evidence in support of the creationist theory in Hier. Ep. 165.1, but at the same time points out to him the need to provide additional arguments and analyze a number of its weak points, which generally corresponds to the intonation of the entire letter. Sall. lug.: 2, 3 (trans. Sallust, Gorenstein, 1981: 2, 3). Ruf. Apol. 3, 28. In the latest edition of the Apology (CCSL 79) its third book is highlighted as Epistula aduersus Rufinum. Augustine moves on to the next objection to creationism. Rufinus's objection, according to Jerome, is this: if God creates souls for every person at birth, then He also creates them for those who were born in adultery, and therefore contributes in this way to the sins of people (which is impossible). God cannot create souls for children born as a result of the sin of adultery, from which it follows that the bodies of those born in adultery can only be a punishment for souls who committed some sin before their incarnation. Matthew 8:31–32; Mark 5:12–13; Luke 8:32–33. A. Furst notes the similarity of these arguments of Augustine with a passage from Jerome’s letter 130 to Demetrius (Furst, 2011:432–435). In Jerome, these arguments belong to the Origenist heretic (his collective image). Of course, Jerome could not have Augustine in mind: his letter 130 was written about a year earlier than Augustine's letter 166. However, it is noteworthy that such an argument, implying the pre-existence of souls and some kind of sin committed by them, is concluded by Jerome as “fraud and incitement” with the help of which the Origenists “try to destroy the truth” (omnes fraudulentias eorum et cuniculos, quibus nituntur subueritatem, Hier. 130. 16). Wed. Aug. De civ. D. 11.23. Wed. Aug. De civ. D. 12.21. Rome. 5:12. The concept of original sin in the Western Church is based primarily on this passage from the letter of the Apostle Paul. Augustine's understanding of it depended on the Latin translation; both the Vetus Latina and Jerome's versions offer a reading in quo omnes peccauerunt (Bouteneff, 2008:41–42; Vetus Italica, Sabatier, 1751:610).