About St. Augustine

St. Augustine's life came at a difficult time. The time for the “Roman peace” has long passed: the turmoil within the state did not stop; the imperial throne became a toy of soldiers' willfulness and human ambition. Barbarians were rising in the North and West; The Persian kingdom, strong in its organization and army, threatened from the East. Wars demanded money and money, taxes doubled and tripled within the memory of a single generation. The place of free, freely chosen activity was taken by the forced labor of people attached to their work and position for life. Fear is considered the only valid means of controlling people. Corporal punishment for a Roman citizen in the 1st and 2nd centuries. n. e. unthinkable; now a decurion, a member of the ruling elite in his city, can be flogged. Woe to the community that incurred the wrath of an imperial official; its members will be mutilated on the rack and reduced to beggars. There is no confidence in the future, there is nothing strong and stable. Did this world, shaken to its very foundations, realize that it was living its last days? As if not. Inscriptions from Africa speak of a “Golden Age reigning everywhere” (Année epigraphique, 1911, no. 217), of “the youth and strength of the Roman name” (J. M. Reynolds and J. B. Ward-Perkins. The inscriptions of Roman Tripolitian, p. 134, no. 471). Prudentius wrote that a long life taught Rome to despise that which has an end (Symmachum 2.660). But Roman art no longer knows a realistic portrait: these people, with a frozen gaze directed upward, do not see what is around them: they are busy with their inner life. Praetextatus, one of the last great senators of the pagans, contemptuously dismisses his usual titles and speaks of mystical initiation as a “true blessing” (CILVI. 1779). Ambrose came to Milan as a ruler - and became a bishop; Peacock, a noble and rich man with a brilliant career opening up, suddenly left Gaul and became a monk in the small unknown Nola. Christianity, which seemed to its apologists as a unifying and reconciling force, caused new strife and unrest: the old religion was at enmity with the new; In Christianity itself, heresies and schisms arose. Jerome wrote about a little girl born at that time: “in such a world Pakatila was born. Misfortunes surrounded her during her games. She learned to cry before she laughed...” (Hier. Er. 128.5). Blessed Augustine was born on November 13, 354 in Tagaste (now Souk-Aras in Algeria). The area was flourishing; The boy, growing up, saw around him the beauty of the lower world, to which he had been so receptive all his life - the land cultivated by human hands: grain fields, orchards, olive groves - and dense forests on the mountains, where the “African animals” hid, which the organizers of hunts in amphitheaters dreamed of. Metropolitan Nikodim of Leningrad and Novgorod at the relics of St. Augustine during a visit to the church named after him in Pavia, Italy, October 16, 1975 The “Brilliant Council of Tagasta,” as the city council calls itself in the inscriptions (CILVIII. 5145, 5146, 5150), ruled a small and poor town, which, however, was the center of Roman civilization for its surroundings. From the hints scattered throughout the Confession, one can get some idea of ​​the life of an ordinary citizen of Tagasta: he knows everyone in the city, and all the townspeople know him; his betrayal of his wife, his property status, and the incidents that happened to him are vividly discussed in homes and on the streets. Everyone bears the burden of worries, their own and those of the city; friendly chatter and gossip serve as entertainment and relaxation. The city seems to be completely Romanized: Latin is not only the language of official documents and inscriptions; modest artisans, somehow coping with cases and verbs, compose Latin tombstones for themselves; Latin speech is heard on the streets and in houses, and the school is Latin. Latin was Augustine's native language. Latin civilization was accepted voluntarily and wholeheartedly. But she was unable to remake the spiritual image of these new Romans, inherited from a long line of Berber ancestors. Berber blood flowed not only in the veins of all the indigenous inhabitants of Tagasta, but also of all natives of Africa. Africa created a completely new type of “intellectual”, who in a unique way perceived Latin culture and reworked it “in the African way” in accordance with the original national characteristics. The Latin language of African authors acquired its own peculiar coloring; he is overloaded with all sorts of tricks of oratory, flowery, bright and sometimes tiresome; African Christianity is tense and excited, African Christians need communication with the other world, and they put themselves in an ecstatic state by intoxication and dancing. “Numbers and Worlds” is not for these people: with them everything is in moderation, everything is over the edge. Virgil, who felt with exceptional acuteness the tragedy of not only human fate, but also the fate of everything earthly, is restrained and circumspect in his deepest grief: it does not cross out the whole world for him. For Augustine, the death of his young friend was the collapse of the world, and he got out from under its rubble only thanks to the indestructible vitality of his physically healthy youth. The African gives himself entirely to what has captured him, whether it be the search for truth or the “love of love”; during religious persecution, these people themselves seek suffering and death, so the Bishop of Carthage has to restrain their ardor; the religious zeal of the Donatists, which drove them to suicide, borders on intoxication and madness. Peace and balance are not for these hearts; they are always in tension, in struggle: figures from the Pergamon altar, and not from Hellenic friezes. The “ancient chaos” invariably “stirs” in the African soul, and Augustine managed to curb it only through years of severe monastic discipline and a strict consciousness of his responsibility for thousands and thousands of souls. The family into which he was born was by no means rich: Augustine recalled that a member of the city council, his father Patricius, owned only a few small plots of land. In order to give his son a high education, the Patrician and the whole family had to cut down on the bare necessities and walk around in rags. They knew the value of education in Tagaste: through it there was a path that led a person out of the poverty and slumber of a provincial town onto the “white roads” of honors and wealth. “I was born in a village from a poor and uneducated father; studies in literature and science gave me the opportunity to live the life of a noble man,” wrote Augustine’s contemporary and also a native of Africa, Aurelius Victor (De Caesar. 20.5). The patrician, a pagan, and his wife, Monica, a zealous Christian, disagreeing with each other in many respects, unanimously decided to send their son to the Carthaginian rhetoric school, for reasons, however, different: the father had “completely empty thoughts” about his son: he dreamed of his brilliant career; his mother hoped that Augustine's education would lead him to Christianity. Augustine had no spiritual connection with his father: to tell the story of his friend’s death, he found words that, fifteen hundred years later, hit the heart. He mentioned his father's death in passing, in a brief note. Strong, unrelenting love on both sides connected the son with his mother. Monica was an extraordinary woman. She deliberately kept herself in the shadows, but quietly and silently controlled the entire house. Her common sense and everyday tact helped her establish a harmony and disposition in the family that amazed all Tagasta’s gossips. She knew how to wait, and walked towards her goal slowly but steadily. She eventually led her husband, a man completely indifferent to religion, “who had no thoughts about God” (II, 8), to Christianity. She herself, the daughter of a Christian family, was a convinced Christian, strictly observed the customs of the African Church (fasting on Saturdays, long all-night services at the graves of martyrs), and believed, like everyone else around her, in mysterious voices and revelations sent in dreams. This mystical mood coexisted perfectly with a sober consideration of everyday requirements. The Patrician's decision to send Augustine to Carthage was vividly supported by Monica (and, perhaps, imperceptibly prompted by her); she insisted on Augustine's break with the woman with whom he lived for fifteen years, with whom he had a son and to whom he was strongly attached. This breakup cost him dearly, but Monica understood perfectly well that a legal marriage with a girl from a rich and noble family would significantly help her son’s career. Augustine obeyed. Apparently, it was difficult for him to contradict this persistent, demanding and domineering love, which sometimes made it difficult to breathe: after all, he ran away as an adult, an independent person, secretly from his mother to Rome. He was independent in his spiritual quest. It is possible that his mother’s unabating anxiety, her prayer and tears for him, a heretic and skeptic, to some extent contributed to his return to the Church, but one should not exaggerate its influence, as most Western scientists do. Augustine, in his search for truth, followed his own path: the anger of Monica, who kicked him, a Manichaean, out of his home, did not turn him away from Manichaeism; Not out of obedience to his mother, but through a long and circuitous path, he came to the Church. Augustine's parents gave him the best education for that time. He completed his full course - from elementary school in Tagaste to the “university” - the rhetoric school in Carthage. The school of rhetoric is now not in honor either in our science or in Western science. Its shortcomings are too obvious for it to be defended as a whole. The education she provided, from our point of view, was extremely meager: no exact sciences, no natural sciences, no history - only an acquaintance with classical literature, and then very limited: Virgil, Cicero, Sallust, Terence - these are all the authors that Augustine read at school. The teacher commented on the text being analyzed in class, paying main attention to its literary advantages and disadvantages, and wove into this commentary random and scattered information necessary for understanding the text. The pupil of the rhetoric school did not endure a real solid education from it. She gave him something else, and here her merit is undeniable: she taught him the ability to handle words, the art of using its weight, its strength. For a good student of this school, language became a rich tool with the help of which it was possible to convey the most complex overflows of thoughts and feelings. If the owner of the instrument turned out to be a “despicable buffoon,” then from his hands came a word adorned with shades of verbal mastery, but a hopelessly weak word, an excellent idea of ​​which is given by the suazories and contraversions in the book of Seneca the Father. But when the instrument was in the hands of a thinker and artist, then works of great beauty and great power arose. Both Tacitus and Augustine came from the school of rhetoric. Following the school routine, Augustine had to read Cicero's dialogue "Hortensius"; Cicero, following Aristotle, argued that all earthly goods are worthless compared to wisdom, and that only a life devoted to its search is worthy of a person. More than twenty years later, Augustine remembered the impression this book made on him: “I was suddenly disgusted with all empty hopes, I desired immortal wisdom in my incredible heartfelt turmoil” (III. 7). There was only one way to calm this confusion: one had to love wisdom (diligerem), seek it, find it (quaererem, adsequerer), master it, “cling” to it (tenerem, amplexerem), that is, be imbued with it, live according to its instructions. As we see, “wisdom” (sapientia-philosophia) for Augustine did not mean at all the scientific discipline that we understand under the name of philosophy. It was a practical guide that helped a person understand his Divine origin, overcome vain dreams and hopes for worldly success, and establish himself on the path of self-improvement, which will lead him to God. One thing confused Augustine: in “Hortensia” there was no name of Christ, and “all the works that did not have this name, even if artistic, polished and full of truth, did not completely capture me” (III. 8). Turning to the Bible in search of wisdom was quite natural: Augustine grew up in a Christian environment (the pagan nihilism of his father had no influence on him), was introduced into the Church as a catechumen and did not think of breaking with it. Christian intelligentsia of the 4th century. perceived Christianity precisely as genuine wisdom. On the sarcophagi of this time, Christ is usually represented as a teacher, surrounded by disciples, whom he teaches wisdom. “Here, here is what all philosophers were looking for throughout their lives and could not keep track of, find... He who wants to become a wise man, a real man, let him listen to the voice of the Lord” (Lactant. Divinae Institutiones III. 30). The Bible scared off Augustine: the brilliant student of the rhetoric school was offended by the Latin language of its translations, the biblical legends seemed “absurd” (VI. 6; cf. III. 42); the story of the creation of man;: in the image and likeness of God - an insult to Divine dignity. Did Augustine discuss these issues with representatives of the Church? - unlikely; Yes, this conversation would not have yielded good results. The African Church was extremely conservative, and a faithful Christian was supposed not to ask inappropriate questions. Augustine was proud of his mind, relied on it (see the story of how he mastered Aristotle’s Categories. IV. 28) and was by no means inclined to recognize “miracle, mystery and authority.” And then he found himself (incidi and inciden, usually with a touch of chance: “stumbled upon”, “unexpectedly met”; among the Manichaeans, who were witty and strong in the interpretation of the Old Testament; it is possible that Augustine’s acquaintance with the Manichaeans began from conversations on Old Testament topics. Manichaeism did not come from the Church; This is not a heresy, like Arianism, but an independent religion. Its founder, Mani, wrote a lot, but nothing has survived from his books. Sources for getting acquainted with Manichaeism are: 1) the works of church writers, primarily the works of St. Augustine, directed against the Manichaeans; 2) Arab historians of the 9th-12th centuries. and 3) fragments of Manichaean dogmatic texts found in 1900 near Turpan (Chinese Turkestan) and in 1031 in Egypt, in Fayum. All this rich and varied material familiarized researchers with both the biography of Mani and the nature of his teaching. Mani was born in 216 AD. e. in Babylonia in a noble family related to the royal house of the Arsacids. In his childhood and youth he had some visions that prompted him to found a new religion. He is a wanderer and missionary, a brilliant preacher, he went around Iran with his preaching, maybe even to India; He sent his disciples far to the West to preach his teachings. Favorably received at court in his youth (he was on the staff of Shapur I during his campaign against Rome in 242–244), he was martyred under Bagram I in 277 at the instigation of the magicians, who accused him of destroying the state religion of the Persians. His followers began to be brutally persecuted; fleeing persecution, they spread the teachings of Mani far to the East and West. In the 4th century. There were Manichaeans in Africa, Italy, Spain and Gaul. Christianity at that time could hardly have met a stronger opponent. Manichaeism is not a national religion, referring to a specific country and people, like Judaism or Mohammedanism: it addresses all countries and all peoples; it promises salvation to all humanity through the highest, perfect knowledge. This knowledge reveals to the soul its true nature: “I came to know my soul and the body that weighs over it. They have been enemies since the creation of the world." (C. R. C. Allberry. A Manichean Psalmbook, p. 56). The soul is a particle of deity, lost in matter, from which it must be freed. "I shed this pathetic shell of flesh, I cause the pure feet of my soul to trample upon it confidently." The path of salvation consists in the separation of the soul from the world, in the progressive destruction of everything material in man. This soteriology is inscribed in the general doctrine of the presence of two principles in the world: Good and Evil. The Manichaean myth tells of two kingdoms: in the north is the region of Good and Light, and at its head is the Father of Greatness; in the south lies the kingdom of darkness, ruled by the King of Darkness. Finding himself once on the border with the region of Light, he planned to defeat it and take possession of it. A struggle between two principles begins, light and dark. The Father of Greatness sends various emanations of his light essence into the region of darkness; they mix with particles of darkness and lose their original light, but at the same time weaken the dark forces: a certain mixture of both elements arises, light and dark, good and evil - the world and man appear. The eternal struggle between the two principles will lead to the gradual release of light particles, which the sun and the moon, these “heavenly ships”, transport to the kingdom of light, thus increasing its power all the time. The light must return to its place... Darkness will fall and will not rise" Manichaeism offers, as it were, a complete system of knowledge in which everything is explained: the origin of the world, the nature of the soul, the purpose of human life; ethical instructions are given and the final victory of good is promised. Not only is the cause of evil explained, but also a way out of its kingdom is indicated: move away from this world, renounce as much as possible all earthly activities, family, work, property. It is significant that the emperors: the Roman Diocletian in 297 AD. e. and the Chinese Lu-Liu in 1166 ordered the burning of Mani's books. People from all walks of life joined Manichaeism: rich and poor, court nobility and simple craftsmen. Manichaeism was favored by stubborn pagans, who rightly saw in it a threat to Christianity; Among the Manichaeans there were pagans who had internally broken with paganism for a long time, but did not accept the biblical stories and turned away as if from madness from the Gospel narratives about the death on the cross and the Resurrection of Christ, and members of the Christian Church who dreamed of transforming it with higher ethical demands (Favst of Milev also belonged to these). With his characteristic ability to “see himself,” Augustine accurately explained the reason for his transition to Manichaeism. He needed to justify and justify his faith with reason, and the Manichaeans just promised “everyone who wants to listen to them will be brought to God and freed from all errors, guided only by reason, refusing authority and its threats... (Christians) are ordered to believe, and not to reason. They do not force anyone to believe, but reveal the truth after a preliminary discussion of it. Who wouldn't be tempted by such promises? especially a young man who thirsted for truth... a talkative, proud man” (De util. cred. I. 2). The “proud man” decided that “one should trust more in those who teach, and not in those who command” (De beata vita I. 40). In addition, the Manichaeans successfully, as it seemed to Augustine then, solved the problem of evil. He had an exceptionally acute perception of guilt and sin. This property made him remember himself, a child, as “a little boy and a great sinner” (I. 19); it turned the petty theft of bad pears into a serious crime - this episode was woven with a bright thread into the fabric of bitter thoughts about the human soul, disinterestedly loving crime - it painted him in his youth as a kind of monster of depravity and vice - a portrait that, according to contemporaries, did not at all correspond to reality, which became a textbook in later church historical literature. Let all this be stated in the Confession from the point of view of the Bishop of Hippo, and not from the point of view of a twenty-year-old youth, but there is no doubt that this youth was troubled by remorse and was outraged by the evil around him. He did not like his own behavior - he prayed for the granting of chastity to him - the actions of the “overthrowers” ​​were invariably disgusting (eversores III. 6). The question of where evil comes from “tormented me in my youth and, tired, pushed me towards heretics,” wrote Augustine in 388 (De lib. arb. I. 2, 4). The Manichaeans not only explained the origin of evil, they forgave the guilty person and absolved responsibility for it: it is not a person who sins, but those particles of the evil principle that are in him: “It was flattering for me to excuse myself and blame something else that was with me and at the same time was not me” (V. 18). Augustine became interested in Manichaeism: he probably made friends with prominent Manichaeans who understood what a gain this young man was for them, and she apparently flattered him: “this friendship, like a chain, wrapped itself around my neck many times,” Augustine recalled (De duab. anim., 9.11); he read “the works of thick Manichaean books” (3.10) and preached Manichaeism. A man of a warm and tender heart, who had a rare gift for friendship without wear and tear, he converted his closest friends to his new faith: that nameless young man, whose death forced him to flee from his native Tagasta, Alipius, his patron Romanian. There were others: Augustine recalled the “disastrous victories” that he won over “inexperienced Christians” who tried in vain to defend their faith (De duab. anim., uk. place), before the pressure of his logic, eloquence and simply his personal charm. “With my pathetic and insane chatter I was destroying the Christian faith” (De dono persever. 20.53). Augustine remained a Manichaean, in his words, “for about nine years”; During this time he gradually moved away from them. Much contributed to this departure: the inconsistency of Manichaean metaphysics: “if the forces of darkness could harm the deity, then, consequently, he does not have the fullness of perfection and power, and if they could not, then why did he have to fight with them? – Nebridius’s question, which he “loved to propose”) (7.3); the convincing speeches of “a certain Elpidius” who spoke out against the Manichaeans (5.21); reading books on astronomy. Augustine, with his honest mind, could not help but be embarrassed when comparing strictly substantiated and empirically verified astronomical data with “the endless fables (of the Manichaeans) about the sky and the stars, about the sun and the moon” (5.12). And people disappointed: the “elect” did not at all comply with the prescriptions of Manichaean ethics (De mor. manich., 19. 67–73); Faustus, the most authoritative man among the Manichaeans, turned out to be a complete ignoramus. Augustine hoped that he would unfold before him the pages of Manichaean teaching, still unknown to him, and saw that there was nothing to expect: “acquaintance with him cut short all my efforts to move forward in this sect” (5. 19). Augustine chose a teaching career for himself and was an excellent teacher: his teaching method was unusual for that time. We can get some idea about him using his essay “On the Training of Catechumens” and dialogues that depict life in Kassatiak. Augustine took into account the psychology of adolescence and youth (complete news for that time), tried to awaken the thoughts of his students, taught them to think independently, was able to comment on a school text in a new, fresh and unexpected way and use it for a moral lesson. School activities, victories in literary competitions, and close acquaintance with the proconsul and the provincial nobility (Firmin) - all promised a brilliant career and inspired confidence in one’s own abilities. Carthage became too small for Augustine - and he moved to Rome. Rome greeted him unkindly: he immediately fell seriously ill, and soon became disillusioned with the Roman school order. Only a position as a rhetorician in a public school could give him a solid position. That's exactly what it turned out to be. A delegation of Mediolans turned to Symmachus, prefect of Rome, with a request to recommend to them a teacher for their rhetoric school. A competition was organized; His Manichaean friends who lived in Rome argued for Augustine, and Symmachus chose him. That Symmachus liked Augustine’s test speech, despite his African accent (De ord. II. 17.45), is quite likely, but he had his own goals that made him prefer Augustine. The imperial court was located in Milan at that time; a teacher of rhetoric, who was in the public service, was obliged to write official panegyrics for the emperor and consuls of a given year. These speeches were not mere rhetorical exercises: their author had to skillfully and convincingly present government policy in laudatory terms: he “organized public opinion” (see A. Cameron, Wandering Poets; “A literary Movement in Byzantine Egyptian Historia”, 1965, B. 14, pp. 470–509). The role was extremely important, and Symmachus, a convinced pagan, ardently but unsuccessfully defended the old Roman religion, having already suffered heavy defeats in this struggle, very willingly entrusted this role to a Manichaean, a man belonging to a community that was a dangerous enemy of the Church. Augustine arrived in Milan with complete turmoil in his soul. He, still young, earthly ambitious, confident in his mind, was bitter to think that he had been “fooled and deceived for so long with the promise of reliable knowledge” (6.5); he wanted to “expose the Manichaean lie” (V. 25), and the skepticism of the New Academy came to his liking here (he became acquainted with its philosophy through Cicero’s treatise: Asademica). The Manichaeans claimed to have complete knowledge; according to the “Academicians”, perfect knowledge is generally inaccessible to man; it is reckless to insist on the unconditional truth of any teaching: a person, in his search for truth, only manages to reject false theories: “I had the idea that the most reasonable were the philosophers called Academicians: they believed that everything was subject to doubt and that truth was generally inaccessible to man” (V. 19): “I despaired of finding the truth” (VI. 1). “My helmsmen were the Academicians” (De bcata vit I. 4), wrote Augustine, but he did not belong to people who could live in denial. “When I was in Italy,” he later recalled, “I often had conversations with myself about the method of finding the truth; it often seemed to me that it was impossible to find it, and the current of my thoughts carried me to the Academy. On the other hand, when I thought about the human mind, so strong, so insightful, so far-seeing, it began to seem to me that it was not the truth that was hidden, but the method by which it could be found. It can be obtained from an authority. How, however, can one find this authority when it was offered by so many teachers arguing among themselves! Here an impenetrable thicket stood in front of me, and after a while I got tired of trying to break through it; in spite of everything, however, my mind was constantly driven by the desire to discover the truth” (De util. cred. 8.20); “My soul lived in intense search and restless reflection,” echoes the “Confession” (VI. 3). For now, he decided to remain “at the level on which his parents placed him” - to be a catechumen in the Milan church. This decision was also reflected in Augustine’s ambitious dreams at that time: a brilliant career was opening up before him, and belonging to the official Church, even if only as a catechumen, ensured to a certain extent advancement along this “broad road of the world.” Upon arrival in Milan, Augustine appeared before the Milanese Bishop Ambrose. Ambrose was not only the largest church figure of that time: his influence on the course of state affairs in general was enormous. The Western Church owes its triumph to a large extent to him: the efforts of the pagan party to preserve paganism were crushed by him [Ambrose turned directly to Emperor Valentinian II, threatening him with excommunication from the Church if he agreed to the requests of the pagans (cf. 17)]; Saint Ambrose emerged victorious from the struggle with the Arians. He did not pay much attention to Augustine; They did not establish a close acquaintance; Augustine did not have the chance to talk with Ambrose the way he wanted. Augustine described in detail in his Confessions the significance of Ambrose’s sermons for him: his explanations of the Old Testament in the “spiritual sense” destroyed the Manichaean criticism of biblical stories: under their “letter,” dark and often confusing, hid a “spirit,” a secret thought. expressed categorically, elevating the soul and taking it to another world. Almost all the philosophers of the ancient world were far from a spiritual worldview: they conceived of deity as a special type of matter, endowed with vital force and penetrating the entire universe. Such is the divine “fire” of the Stoics; such is the subtlest ether of the Manichaeans, in which the world rests like a sponge in the ocean. Augustine told in his Confessions how difficult it was for him to achieve the comprehension of a purely spiritual substance. The philosophy of the Neoplatonists, to which the educated society of that time, both pagan and Christian, was drawn, helped him to understand it. Augustine was not alone in his quest. The works of Plotinus, one of the most difficult writers of antiquity, were avidly read, rewritten and discussed. How great the demand for them was in the West is evidenced by the translation of many of Plotinus's treatises into Latin by Marius Victorinus. Bishop Ambrose drew both words and thoughts from the Aenead. An admirer and expert of Plotinus was his confessor Simplician, with whom Augustine often talked. There was a circle of “Platonists” in Milan; Augustine dedicated his treatise De beata vita to one of its members, a prominent political figure and zealous reader of Plotinus, Mallius Theodorus. Plotinus was born in 204 AD. e. in Lycopolis (Upper Egypt), studied philosophy in Alexandria with Ammonius Sacca, who was at one time a Christian and sought to unite the philosophies of Plato and Aristotle. Wanting to get acquainted with Eastern philosophy. Plotinus took part in Gordian's campaign against the Persians. The Roman army was defeated in Mesopotamia, Plotinus barely managed to escape to Antioch, from where he moved to Rome, where he spent 25 years (died in 270 AD in Campania, on the estate of one of his friends). His teaching of philosophy was of a unique nature. He was not so much a philosopher-scientist as a “spiritual father,” a moral leader of his listeners. His lectures were open to everyone, but they were difficult even for those trained in philosophy; most dropped out. There remained a small circle of educated people (among them were Emperor Gallienus and his wife Salonina), whom Plotinus addressed as friends. He never systematically expounded his teachings, did not write a single line until he was 50, and did not seek to disseminate his writings. They were collected and to some extent systematized by Plotinus's student Porphyry, who wrote his biography. The time when Plotinus lived was a sad time: there was neither faith nor hope for the future. Early Greek philosophy is addressed to the world, its morality is prescribed by the laws of this earthly life. Plotinus leads away from the earth to what he considers imperishable and eternal. The cornerstone of Plotinus' philosophy is his doctrine of the Trinity. At its head is το εν - “One”: Good, God. Only by adapting to human weakness, they give a name to the One about whom no one can say anything. He is self-sufficient and abides in eternal peace. He does not need to create anything, but He is the Source of all existence, all thought and all activity. Being present in all consciousness, He is different and separated from it. The second hypostasis of Plotinus' Trinity is Reason. He is from the One, like a ray from the sun, but the One does not lose anything from this emanation, just as a source that fills rivers does not lose water, just as a flower that fills everything around with fragrance does not lose its aroma. The mind contains within itself the entire intelligible world, the world of ideas, the originals of everything that exists - not only general types, but also individual existences (their samples). From the Mind - the World Soul. From him she receives ideas, and her function is to give form and beauty to the material world. Matter was not created by a force hostile to the One; it flows from the Divine source, but just as light and heat weaken as they move away from their source and finally disappear in complete darkness and cold, so the emanation of Divine light and heat gradually weakens in nature until it reaches the complete absence or deprivation of truth and good in matter - this is non-existence, that is, evil. By the power of the World Soul, matter is partially redeemed: the order and beauty of the world of phenomena is the result of its influence on matter. Some souls, however, wanting to become independent, separated from the World Soul (and it is the “house of souls”, where they are in joyful communication, although without words and sounds) and descended into material bodies. These are the inhabitants of our world. In words full of amazing lyrical power, Plotinus pours out his grief for these fallen souls. Like children separated from their parents for a long time, they forgot their father and lost knowledge of themselves. They are absorbed in the pursuit of pleasures and activities unworthy of their high birth. In every person, however, albeit unconsciously, there lives a desire to return “home,” although he continues to follow crooked paths. There are, however, people who understand their falling away; they consciously seek the road that will lead them to the Father. Plotinus points it out: it is necessary to cleanse the soul, free it from earthly desires and pride, from the love of life and from the fear of death. This is achieved through strict asceticism. The purified soul is immersed in the contemplation of the truth; it must enter into itself, understand that it is a fragment of the Divine, that the spiritual principle present in it testifies to the presence of that higher principle from which it comes. God can reveal himself to a person, and in this revelation a person becomes acquainted with the super-rational and super-worldly principle 1. The impression that Plotinus' philosophy made on Augustine is evidenced by his own confessions made in the Dialogues, written shortly after his acquaintance with Plotinus. The books of Plotinus “ignited him” (De beata vita I. 4), “kindled a fire in his soul,” “fanned him with the scent of Arabia” (p. Acad. 2. 2. 5). In “Confession,” his review of Neoplatonism is colder, but he retained respect for the Platonists until the end of his days: “if these people could live their lives with us again, they would see with the help of which authority it is easier to help people; by changing some words and thoughts, they would become Christians, as many Platonists of our day have become” (De vera relig. 7; written between 388 and 391); “There is no one who is closer to us Christians than the Platonists,” he will say in “The City of God.” in his later work (8.5). Reminiscences from the Enneads are scattered throughout the Confessions. Plotinus helped Augustine resolve the problem of evil that tormented him so much (amazing page 7. 11–12); Augustine's reasoning that evil is not an independent substance (7. 18) is a detailed commentary on Plotinus' position “evil is a lack of good” (Ann. 3. 2. 5), “perfect poverty” (Ann. 1. 8. 3); the cosmos is governed by wise laws; those who scold the world are mistaken because they consider it in parts and not as a whole (Ann. 3.2); “...and vice is useful...it keeps us awake; it awakens our mind, prompting us to rebel against the ways of evil” (Ann. 3. 2. 5, cf. “Confession” 7. 19–22). Plotinus confirmed the words of Ambrose that “the will, free in its decision, is the reason that we do evil” (7.5): “Why have souls forgotten God, their Father? the beginning of evil in them is self-will (τόλμα), separation, the desire to be independent; rejoicing in their independence, they run away from God...” (Ann. 5. 1. 1). And finally, the Platonists “brought me back to myself” (7.16): entering into myself. reflection on the activity of the mind, on one’s own spiritual energy helped to understand what spiritual substance is: “I found that above my changeable thought there is an unchanging, real and eternal Truth” (7.23). For Augustine, to know the Truth meant to live in accordance with it (8.1). It was not so simple: “... the new will that was emerging in me... was powerless to overcome the old one, which had become stronger and more obsolete” (8.10). Plotinus showed man the path of strict asceticism, as the only one leading to God, and left man on this path only to his own strengths. Augustine knew from personal bitter experience how insufficient these forces were. And this consciousness, and the “Christian air” in which he lived in Milan, naturally led him to the Church The famous scene in the garden was the natural conclusion of a long and difficult journey. It gives the impression of instant rebirth only due to its brightness: a dazzling flash makes you forget that all the pages of this amazing book are filled with the same light, only more diffused. It would not occur to an open-minded and attentive reader to doubt the reality of this scene. Only a person could declare it a complete literary invention - a victim of extensive book wisdom that stood between him and the heart, which confessed “before the eyes of the Lord.” In this regard, it is worth dwelling on the question that at the end of the last century was posed by such an expert on Augustine and early Christianity as Harnack, and such a major researcher of the Roman world as Boissier: can the Confessions be trusted? Both scientists, and after them a number of Augustine researchers, answered negatively: Augustine is depicted in the Confessions not at all as he was during this period of his life. It is enough to compare the “Confession,” written 10–14 years after the scene in the garden, and the “Dialogues” (“Against the Academicians,” “On the Blessed Life,” “On Order”), written in Kassaciak a few months later, to see the difference in the spiritual atmosphere of the “Confession” and these early works. In “Confession” - a gloomy sinner, assessing his past life from the point of view of a strict bishop; in “Dialogues” - a complacent teacher leading conversations with his students on philosophical topics, a man who converted not to Christianity at all, but to Neoplatonism, who knows little about Christianity and does not think about it. It is difficult to imagine how this point of view could persist for more than half a century, and now it has not yet been completely overcome. In Kassaciak, Augustine not only poses philosophical questions and discusses them with his disciples, but prays and reads Scripture: the “Dialogues” are imbued with quiet clarity, this is true: the feeling of peace that a person experiences when he has finally reached a quiet haven is natural. And this peace was not completely cloudless: Augustine thought about the past and repented: “Do not double my sorrows. I’ve had enough of my wounds: almost every day with tears I pray to God to heal them” (De ord. I. 7. 29–30). And, finally, a completely definite statement, in the mouth of a person - a follower of pure Neoplatonism - is inappropriate: “I know that I will never depart from Christ, because I do not find a stronger authority” (p. Acad. 3. 20. 43). Some consider the reason for writing the “Confession” to be the request of Pavlin of Nolan: Pavlin asked Alypius, then already a bishop in Tagaste (395), to send him his autobiography; Alypius “out of humility and modesty” refused, and Augustine promised to do it in his place, about which he wrote to Pavlinus (Letter 27). A correspondence began between them, which, unfortunately, was partially lost. It is quite possible that Peacock turned to Augustine with such a request to describe his life. According to others, St. Augustine wrote the Confessions in order to protect himself from the attacks of his many enemies. This is unlikely to be true. It was precisely the “Confession” that put into the hands of these enemies rich material for accusing the author, who did not at all hide his mistakes and delusions: in the “Confession” Augustine accuses himself, and does not defend himself. The reason why Augustine wrote the Confession is indicated by its title: the word confessio has two meanings: 1) “repentance”, “confession of sins” and 2) “gratitude”. Augustine repented and gave thanks; grief over his sinfulness and human weakness in general, gratitude to God for having pulled him out of “such an abyss,” a feeling of direct connection with Him and the consciousness of His constant guidance (“the most distant and the closest”) - all this filled the soul, demanded to be poured out in words and left a special stamp on the language of the “Confession.” No translation gives any idea about it. A rich vocabulary, poetic and emotional, skillful use of the rhetorical arsenal of metaphors, antitheses, comparisons and personifications, finely calculated repetitions; skillful arrangement of words, replacing short, simple, purely colloquial phrases with sentences of two or even three parts of approximately equal length; magnificent sound instrumentation; assonances (sometimes even rhymes), alliteration, a varied combination of stresses, alternation of long and short, deliberate selection of vowels (some places of the Confession are poems in prose) - all this magical power over the word, flaming with thought and feeling, turns the style of the Confession into some kind of fiery element that covers the reader and forces not just to read Augustine, but to live with him, experiencing his life. “Confession” is a kind of poetic meditation, reflection on oneself, theology about oneself. Augustine wrote the “Confession” because he could not help but confess “before the eyes of the Lord,” but he also had in mind the benefits for people: “this confession awakens those who read and listen to it... it forces them to stay awake, relying on Thy mercy and Thy grace” (10.4, compare also 2.5 and 15; 4.19). The Confessions consists of thirteen books: in the first nine, Augustine talks about his life before his conversion; in the 10th, added later, about himself after the address; 11–13 are devoted to the interpretation of the first chapter of Genesis. How to reconcile such heterogeneous material? The attempt to connect both parts into a single whole (Augustine himself considered the Confessions to be one) is not entirely convincing. It is probably necessary to prove the unity of the Confession not on theological premises, but by studying the compositional techniques characteristic of St. Augustine. St. Augustine wrote the Confessions between 397 and 400; at this time he was already a bishop in Hippo and took an active part in modern events; in the Confession, time and place are essentially absent. What do all the historical upheavals mean before a person’s personal meeting with the One on Whom everything in the world depends - from the movement of the stars to the fall of flying leaves? If the Confession had arrived without the name of the author, if St. Ambrose, the Bishop of Milan, and the Empress Justina had not been mentioned in it, then philologists analyzing its language and style would have rushed between several centuries. Is it possible to guess, reading these pages, that they were written on the eve of the collapse of the Roman Empire, written in a country that over the past 20-30 years has experienced famine, nomadic raids, bloody rebellions, that it is still kept in constant fear by gangs of robbers, that fires, robber ambushes and attacks, violence and murder have become an everyday occurrence. School memories, Carthage, a friendly circle, in a word, all everyday details, with all their clear specificity, are written, like notes, in small print in the margins of the manuscript. These are a kind of algebraic signs into which you can substitute any digital values. Carthage can be replaced by any city from Athens to Paris; Augustine's anxiety about his panegyric - the worries of a courtier during the time of Louis XIV, the anxiety of a presidential candidate, the insomnia of a scientist, a candidate for the highest rank. “Confession” combines two features that seem to exclude one another: the brightest individuality of the author and the amazing universality of his work. Written in constant contact between two planes, temporal and eternal, “Confession” conquered time; It is difficult to find in world literature a work of such unfading vitality. Augustine’s contemporaries were already reading the Confession, as he himself wrote shortly before his death: “I know that the Confession was and is very much liked by the brothers” (Retract. 2.6); “Which of my works is read more than the Confession, which is enjoyed more?” (De bono persever. 20). The influence of the Confession can be traced in several works of medieval literature. Petrarch, who carried the Confession with him on all his travels, wrote: “Whenever I read the Confession, I am moved, often to the point of tears, by two feelings: fear and hope. It seems to me that I am reading the history of my own errors” (De contemptu mundi dial. I). Ten centuries separated Petrarch from Augustine; a man of a different world, a different culture, a completely different mental make-up, while reading the Confession, he was reading about himself. He's not the only one. Thousands of thousands of people behind the “printed lines” of this book read “other lines” - the story of their lives, their quests and losses. The number of its readers, apparently, is not decreasing: over the past 25 years, fifteen of its translations have been published in only three countries (France, England, Germany). “Confession” is an autobiography. Latin literature has known this genre for a long time: already in the 1st century. BC e. government officials of various levels (Emilius Scaurus, Rutplius Rufus, Sulla) wrote their autobiographies. Only pitiful scraps survive of these works; it is impossible to look for any threads connecting the Confession with its distant ancestors; she has close “relatives”, and in their family “Confession”, its “not a common expression” strikes especially strongly. In the old republican times, a young man, while still in his own family, acquired a strong worldview, which was instilled by word and example from his parents, relatives, and the entire environment. Entering life, this lucky man knew firmly what was good and what was bad, what he should believe in and what should be rejected. Unconditional axioms of a religious and moral order were always at hand; there was nothing to ask, nor to seek, nor to doubt. If you believe the letters of Pliny the Younger, then in the remote provincial (in our sense) cities of Italy, this was also the case at the beginning of the Empire. “Time is not wasted”: this stronghold of mental well-being is dealt blow after blow. Already at the turn of the 1st-2nd centuries. n. e. she is unsteady; in the 4th century there is no trace of her. Every serious soul who wanted to comprehend his life had to search, question and understand the chaos of new religions and the contradictions of different philosophical systems on his own - alone, left to his own devices. The completion of these searches was that main turning point when all mysteries and doubts were resolved, the truth was revealed, and on it, as in a quiet haven, the soul could calm down. This moment was called "conversion." Ancient literature, generally very sensitive to all social trends, quickly grasped this structure of thoughts and feelings and put it into a clear scheme of a certain genre. The first examples of it are already among pagan writers (especially interesting are Dion Chrysostom, who turned from a brilliant rhetorician into a poor philosopher-preacher, and Apuleius, who gave a picture of genuine religious conversion in the tenth book of his “Golden Ass”). Christian writers, telling about their wanderings in search of truth, used this genre as a convenient literary form. It forms the basis of the “Conversation with Tryphon” by the apologist of the 2nd century. Hieromartyr Justin the Philosopher: Justin tells how he moved from one philosophical school to another (Stoics, Peripatetics, Pythagoreans, Platonists succeeded each other), how he finally met an elder who introduced him to the Scriptures. “Love for the prophets and people, friends of Christ, flared up in my soul with fire. Pondering the elder’s words, I realized that here is the only true and useful philosophy” (“Dialogue with Tryphon”, 8). Hilary, bishop of the city of Poitiers (IV century), tells in the Prologue to his work “On the Trinity” how he, having become acquainted with various philosophical teachings, became convinced of their emptiness and, having rejected them, began to look for ways to know God. By chance he comes across a Bible; reading the Gospel of John and the Epistles of the Apostle Paul turns him to the Christian faith (De Trinitate, I. 9-14). The “Letter to Donatus” by the Carthaginian bishop Cyprian Monceaux, who specially dealt with Christian writers in Africa (P. Monceaux. Histoire Litterair de l'Afrique chrétienne, t. II, p. 266), is considered the predecessor of the “Confession”. A rich man, a successful rhetorician and lawyer, greedy for pleasure, he lives “in the dark”... “alien to the light of truth, entangled in delusions.” And his conversations with a Christian priest and reading Scripture lead him onto the path of a new life: “the doubtful became true, the closed was opened, the darkness was illuminated, it became possible to do the impossible.” The topic of the appeal was apparently so interesting and close to many that in the 2nd-3rd centuries. works appear where it appears in a treatment that makes one recall an ancient novel. These are the "First Homilia" and "Memoirs", attributed to the Alexandrian bishop Clement; they were translated into Latin in the 4th century. - the translation is almost contemporary with the Confession. Since childhood, the author has been tormented by questions about human mortality and the creation of the world; he longs for immortality and seeks the truth, in this search he goes through different philosophical schools one after another, but instead of truth they offer him only intricately woven syllogisms. Suddenly he learns about the teachings of Christ, plans to go to Judea, meets an apostolic disciple in Alexandria, supports him in a dispute with a self-confident philosopher, meets the Apostle Peter himself and becomes his disciple. Blessed Augustine knew both Hilary (he mentions him in his work “On the Trinity,” VI. 10–11; XV. 3. 5 and Letter 180) and Cyprian, to whom he refers in two sermons (211 and 212) and De doctrina christiana (IV. 14. 31). Perhaps he also knew Saint Clement. This does not mean that he depended on them and borrowed something from them. A person invariably belongs to his time and his circle and has at his disposal a certain “common fund” of ideas, literary forms and verbal expressions. St. Augustine’s “Confessions” is also a story of dealing with the usual topoi for this genre: the search for truth, the transition from one teaching to another, painful meditation, the acquisition of truth. Everything is familiar - and everything is different. The authors of autobiographical “conversions” usually divide their lives into two sharply opposite parts: before the conversion it is full of anxiety, torment, and mistakes; from the moment of treatment ?????, what??. Saint Cyprian, after sailing on a stormy sea, found a quiet pier - these are his own words; Hilary found blissful peace by accepting Christianity. This is not at all the case with St. Augustine: he did not end the Confessions with the moment of conversion; his 10th book tells how difficult and restless the life of a “convert” is: Augustine feels “in a forest full of traps and dangers” (10. 35. 56); earthly life is full of temptations always and everywhere (10. 28–29) and “no one can be calm for himself: if he could turn from bad to good, this does not mean that he will not turn from good to bad” (IV. 32. 48). Man is a mystery to himself: “Which temptations I can resist and which ones I can’t, I don’t know” (10.5.7): the question is raised about the essence of human nature and its capabilities. “Appeals,” depicting the path by which man reached this turning point, dwelled primarily on external facts. “Confession” combines intellectual autobiography with the history of the “heart”, with the history of the inner world. The mournful notes of the 10th book were prompted by a keen and merciless analysis of this world. Once upon a time, relying on Plotinus, Augustine resolved the problem of evil for the universe. Now evil stood before him as a riddle of human behavior: why does a person do evil? does he want harm? and if he wants, then why? Why does he, a sixteen-year-old boy, “enjoy crime”? (2.8.16). Having become accustomed to evil, “enjoying crime,” a person loses the ability to do good: he can consciously choose good and will not be able to carry it out, because his previous actions forged a chain of “habits”, and he, “shackled by no one, is in the shackles of his own will” (8.5.10). The past lives in the present. People differ from each other precisely because different past experiences have shaped their will differently. Blessed Augustine fights not against the forces of hell, but “against powerful habit” (8.11.28). This was a completely unusual and new angle of view; Pelagius was indignant and indignant when he received the 10th book of the Confessions. “Appeals” are optimistic: a person follows his chosen path in a single, unrelenting effort of will; reaches the top and is unshakably established on it. There is no trace of such optimism in Confession. Saint Clement and the author of the “Letter to Donatus” not only taught the reader, but also entertained him. To say about “Confession” that it is “entertaining reading” is blasphemy. This is a sad and stern book. It requires concentrated thought, it tells a person how “poor and poor” he is, forces him to walk along the tangled and crooked paths of life’s journey. How many people cried over this book... and how many it consoled, with the blessing of genius bestowing that catharsis, which, according to Aristotle, is the goal of tragedy. St. Augustine called words “precious vessels.” Literary genres are also “vessels,” and “different food can be served in them, both urban and rural.” The vessel in which the “appeals” were submitted turned out to be too small for the “Confession.” Only the meticulous eye of a literary critic could detect in her a “family resemblance” with forgotten relatives. And only thanks to her they were remembered. After the death of Monica (autumn 387), Augustine returned to Rome, where he wrote several books, and in the autumn of 388 he left for Africa. He sold all the property he inherited and set up a small monastic community in Tagaste (6 people with him). Here he lived for three years, in fasting, prayer and good deeds, meditating day and night on the law of the Lord” (Possidius, 3). He reported the results of these reflections “to those who came in conversations, and to those who were away in books” (ibid.). The name of Augustine apparently became widely known in the area, because when he happened to be in Hippo (25 km from Tagaste), he, at the insistence of the people and against his will, was ordained a priest. The bishop of Hippo, Valery, quickly appreciated the eloquent, educated and ascetic priest and made him his vicar; After the death of Valery, Augustine became a bishop. He was then 42 years old; He remained at the episcopal see in Hippo for 34 years - until his death. Information about the life of St. Augustine during this period is found in his works, mainly in letters and sermons, and in the biography written by Possidio, a student and admirer of Augustine, a member of the monastic community into which Augustine involved the entire clergy of his Hippo. Possidius was in close communication with St. Augustine for forty years and during this time witnessed his life and work. These sources show a side of St. Augustine that was difficult to notice in the Confessions. The man who wrote the “Confession”, as if he lived on a desert island in the middle of a desert ocean, turns out to be a major church leader, a statesman who perfectly understands the needs of the current day and sees tomorrow. He, a priest, and soon a bishop, “is a servant of Christ, and through him a servant of His servants” (letter 21). The Church is surrounded by enemies: paganism, which has not yet been defeated, is enraged at it and undermines it; it is torn apart by heresies: Manichaeans, Donatists, Pelagians. It is necessary to defend the right faith and not only it: Augustine understood that in the chaos of the ensuing collapse, only the Church, strong and united, could unite people. Apostolic Church; only this could save the remnants of culture and protect people from spiritual devastation. And, defending this strength and unity, Augustine wages a stubborn, tireless struggle against the enemies of faith and the Church - he wages it with word and pen. A heretical work has appeared - St. Augustine will immediately put aside the theological treatise, on which he worked with enthusiasm, but which at the moment is not so necessary: ​​“Let me,” he writes to Bishop Euodius, who was pestering him with theological questions, “to deal with what is necessary for many and which therefore should be preferred to studies that are interesting to a very, very small number” (letter 169). The Donatist bishop Petilian addressed his priests with a message accusing and condemning the Church; Augustine, proving the inconsistency of his arguments, writes a refutation “as quickly as he could” (Retr. 2, 25). Manichaeus Secundinus sent him a polite letter from Rome with a brief summary of Manichaean teaching; Augustine immediately responded and considered his answer the most successful criticism of Manichaeism (Retr. 2.10). Pope Boniface (418–422) sent him two Pelagian treatises; Augustine immediately undertakes to write a refutation of them. Thus, from the first years of his bishopric, he took first place among the spiritual leaders of the Western Church; From all sides they turn to him with requests to untangle theological confusions, write in defense of the Church, compile a historical record, and give moral instruction. People write to him from different places in Africa, from Italy, Gaul, Spain; written by representatives of the clergy, government officials, private individuals, written by men and women. Theological interests were at the center of attention of the educated society of that time. They are not just interested in them, they think about them, they live by them. “Some lay brothers who diligently read the Holy Scriptures” sent Augustine a book that brought them confusion and bewilderment: the author argued that someone who has been baptized in faith may not think about good deeds and about correcting his life. St. Augustine replied that faith alone is not enough, works are needed (De fide et operibus 2.38). “Several convinced educated Christians” ask him to show the inconsistency of Manichaean cosmology by explaining the first three chapters of the book of Genesis, but in such a way that these explanations would be understandable to ordinary people (De gen. contra manich. 1. 1). The military tribune Marcellinus is perplexed about some points of the Pelagian teaching (412) -Augustine sends him three books (De peccato-rum meritis et remissione, Retr.); Consentius asks if it is possible to pretend to be a heretic in order to find out all the secrets of the sect; Augustine writes a discussion Contra mendacium, in which he insists on the inadmissibility of pretense and lies (c. 420 Retr. 2.60). To Comita Valerius, who is at the imperial court in Ravenna, he explains the meaning of marriage (Retr. 2.53); the Carthaginian deacon Deogratis asks Augustine to teach him how to deal with the catechumens, and Augustine sends him a detailed treatise with answers to his questions (De catechizandis rudibus. Retr. 2.14), one of the most remarkable works of pedagogical literature. St. Augustine advises the teacher to be consistent with the development of his students: simple and ignorant people must be taught differently than educated people: grammarians and rhetoricians should be especially emphasized and it should be strongly instilled in them that truth is more important than the beauty of style (Augustine remembered his youthful impressions of the Bible). You cannot keep your mind in constant tension; let the teacher make sure his students have fun; let him entertain them with suitable stories from time to time. This work was news for ancient pedagogy, completely indifferent to the psychology of the student; moreover, it indicated the path along which all learning should be conducted. Sometimes Augustine takes up the pen “at the request”, “at the insistence of the brothers”, members of his Hippo monastic community: “by right of love” they demanded from him a book about the Manichaean Faustus (Faust. 1.1; 400). A significant part of Augustine’s literary heritage consists of commentaries on various books of both the Old and New Testaments and theological treatises, of which the most remarkable is De Trinitatë Augustine tried to explain in it one of the main dogmas of Christianity - the dogma of the Trinity of the Divine. This work, together with the Confessions and De civitate Dei, are considered Augustine's main works. De civitate Dei represent the first treatise on the philosophy of history. The capture of Rome by Alaric (410) made a stunning impression on the entire cultural world: the pagans unanimously blamed Christians for all the disasters that befell the Empire. “While we made sacrifices to our gods. Rome stood, Rome was happy; now these sacrifices are prohibited, and you see what has become of Rome” (Sermo, 296). Augustine began by refuting these accusations: Rome was not at all so happy in the first centuries of its existence, when nothing threatened paganism. And there is no need to boast about the enormity of the Empire; Can a state that unjustly seized the lands of its neighbors be considered happy? “What is a kingdom without justice, if not a huge band of robbers? gangs of robbers are, after all, small states” (4, 4). And pagan philosophy could not lead people to happiness. Considering Roman history from this completely unusual angle for those times serves as a prologue to the history of two states that exist on earth, but are not confined to a certain territory and do not include any one people. The book ends with a discussion about the end of the world and the Last Judgment. The literary heritage of St. Augustine is enormous; suffice it to say that in the Collection of Latin Church Writers (Latin Patrology) it occupies 16 volumes (32–47). Two of them are busy with his sermons; 500 of them reached us; part is lost. St. Augustine considered preaching an effective means of educating his flock and his most important duty. “The Lord gave me as a slave to the people of Hippo” (letter 124), “I do not think about the short-term splendor of church honors; I always have before me the thought that I will have to give an account to Christ, the Supreme Leader of all spiritual shepherds, for the flock entrusted to me” (letter 23). And he wants to “work for the salvation, spiritual help and instruction of the brothers” (letter 73). He preaches both in his diocese and outside it, if he is invited; preaches for many days in a row, sometimes twice a day. In his sermons he expounds the texts of Scripture; if it is a holiday, he explains its meaning; if the memory of any martyr, talks about him. He warns his flock about the dangers arising from heresies, explains dogmas; From each text he draws a practical life lesson, a moral instruction. And his flock really needed moral education. They are Christians, but “it is easier to remove idols from the church than to throw them out of the human heart” (In Ps. 98; 138). In difficult times they pray to Jupiter, Mars or the Carthaginian "Heavenly Goddess" (In Ps. 62); when they fall ill, they turn to sorcerers and fortune-tellers, everyone wears pagan amulets, everyone consults the table of lucky and unlucky days compiled by astrologers. They fill the church with noise and din and create outrageous scandals in it (letters 124–126), they are drunkards and debauchees (Sermo, 252). In the fight against all this moral disorder, according to Augustine, one cannot act violently: one must instruct, and not command, not threaten, but convince (letter 22). Local customs, if they do not run counter to Christian morality and religion, should be respected: “a change in customs, even if it is useful, introduces confusion by its very novelty” (letter 54). In a letter to Alypius, St. Augustine tells how he convinced his flock to abandon the custom, which he considered blasphemous and pagan, of organizing drunken revels at their graves and in the church on the day of remembrance of martyrs. The feast of St. Lawrence arrived, which they used to spend wildly and cheerfully, and the preacher suggested spending it in church with prayer and singing psalms. The crowd was agitated and irritated; Augustine managed to calm and reason with her, acting only by the power of his eloquence, which made the whole church cry (letter 29). St. Augustine outlined the theory of Christian eloquence in his treatise De doctrina christiana. The preacher, “a student of the Holy Scripture and a teacher in it” (4:32), must first of all know it well and strive for clarity and simplicity in his explanations. “We must love not words, but the truth in words” (ibid., 4, 26). He himself strictly adhered to this rule: “let the grammarians reproach us better, but the people understand” (In Ps. 138). His sermons are short, their language is simple, without rhetorical tricks. The correspondence of St. Augustine is very interesting (220 letters reached), providing rich material for characterizing the then economic, social and church life in Africa and for characterizing St. Augustine himself. Once upon a time, in the golden days of Kassaciak, Augustine turned to his disciples, who had quarreled among themselves as children, with a sobbing cry: “Be kind” (De ord. 1, 10). He himself was kind with wonderful human kindness, which rushes to help in need, wipe away the tears of others, and stand up for the weak and offended. Everyone can come to him for advice and help. Under the Law of Constantine, the bishop was obliged to act as judge if litigants preferred to appeal to him rather than to their own authorities. Augustine sometimes had to deal with litigation from morning to evening, “he didn’t even have time to eat” (Possidius, 29): not only Christians, but also pagans came to him for a solution. One day he asked his flock to leave him alone for five days, since he needed to do the work assigned by the Church Councils. They promised and quickly broke the promise; “you burst into me, and I was overwhelmed with other people’s affairs until noon and after noon” (213). In those difficult times, the help provided by the Church to the poor was of great importance. Concern for the poor is Augustine's constant concern; The pagans also spoke about this side of his activity with respect (103). “A bishop should not keep money and repulse the outstretched hand,” Augustine once said (Sermo, 355). He does not have his own money (the first requirement for everyone entering his monastic community is not to have any property); he helps from church funds and helps so widely that the clergy, who live on the same funds (they are all members of the same community), begin to complain. He ordered the breaking of church vessels and sold this silver to ransom prisoners and help those in need (Possidius, 24). The Hipponean community forgot in his absence (Augustine was at the Council in Carthage) to provide the poor with clothing; Augustine writes to her and asks her to quickly correct what was lost (122). Some Factius owed 17 gold; he has nothing to pay, and he goes to Augustine. He offers to arrange a collection in his favor, but Factius is ashamed to resort to this means, and then Augustine, having made a promise from Factius that if he could not return the money on time, he would not resist appealing to the people, borrowed money for him from Macedonius, the vicar of Africa and his friend. Faktsy paid off his debts and disappeared. The time of reckoning with Macedon came, and the bishop had to ask his flock to collect money in order to repay a debt made for the sake of another (208). People came to him not only for material help, they sought advice and consolation from him. He knew how to console and went towards grief himself. Having learned about his acquaintance Chrysim, who, having lost his fortune, came into such despair that he wanted to commit suicide, he writes to him about the fragility and unfaithfulness of everything earthly; the personal misfortune of one person is intertwined with the general misfortune of the entire earth, and words about non-attachment to the earthly and temporary acquire special persuasiveness (244). People who have buried their loved ones seek his support and help and find it in the power of faith and conviction that his words breathe: “We rely on immutable promises... we will leave this life... we have not lost those who are dear to us. They only got ahead of us on the path to that life where there is no longer the fear of separation” (92 and 263). His letter to Florentina, a young girl who diligently reads Scripture, does not understand everything and would like to ask him for an explanation, but is embarrassed to write herself and asks her mother to write to St. Augustine, is touching. The old bishop, overwhelmed with affairs (how many times does he complain that they “hold him in a vice”), the recognized spiritual head of the entire Western Church, answers the girl that he will try to help her, but she must write to him about all her difficulties. Just let him not think that he knows everything, he himself learns with those whom he teaches; if she asks him something he doesn't know, he will pray that God will teach him how to answer, or who to turn to who can instruct them both (266). He could be stern and menacing and did not face injustice with the indifferent calm of an outside observer. The rich landowner Romulus was going to collect the rent from his colons a second time: “...God grant that your injustice towards the unfortunate poor does not turn out to be more detrimental to you than to them. They suffer temporarily, and you - think about what you are preparing for yourself on the day of wrath and the righteous Judgment of God... I pray to the Merciful, may He correct you here, and not wait for the day when it is too late to repent... I pray that He will enlighten your mind, so that you will see what you are doing and be horrified... when it is given to you to see this, you will water the earth with tears, asking God to take pity on you... My heart is seriously wounded when I see that This is what my children do according to the Gospel” (247). Bishop Auxilius excommunicated a certain Classician and his entire household from the Church. The excommunicated man turned to St. Augustine, and his letter caused in Augustine “a whole storm of feelings and thoughts.” What reasonable evidence, references to what passages of Scripture will Auxilius explain his action? Is the son responsible for the sin of the father, the wife for the sin of the husband, the servant for the sin of the master? if the Lord revealed to Auxilius that he should have acted exactly as he did, then let Auxilius enlighten him, Augustine: “I, an old man, am ready to learn from a young man; bishop for many years, I am ready to accept teachings from someone who has not yet spent even a year in the episcopal see... do not think that since we are bishops, we cannot be unjust.” Auxilius, apparently, did not listen, and Augustine was going to raise the issue of this matter at the Local Council, and if necessary, then bring it to the attention of the pope (250–251). Possidius reports interesting information about the private life of St. Augustine (chapter 22). He wore not luxurious clothes, but not poor ones either: “he walked the middle path”; at the table he and his clergy eat vegetables, but the sick and guests are served meat; The dishes are wooden and earthenware, but everyone’s spoons are silver. Everyone drinks wine: in the south it is not an excess, but an obligatory seasoning for a meal. It is forbidden to slander; Diners are notified of this by a couplet written on the wall: You want to denigrate and disgrace someone else’s life - Get away from the table: you are not worthy of it. In 429, the Vandals crossed into Africa: Honoratus, Bishop of Tiawa, asks St. Augustine whether it would be better for the clergy to flee and not witness the terrible scenes that, of course, should be expected. St. Augustine replied that during a time of danger that threatens everyone, the shepherd has no right to leave his flock: “No matter how few people remain, our service to them is so necessary that we cannot leave them” (letter 228). He did not leave his flock and died at the age of 76 (in 430) in Hippo, besieged by the Vandals. In his last prayer, he asked to spare the city, and if this is displeasing to God, then to give people the courage and strength to endure this disaster. Sessorianus (S), early 7th century. Beautiful letter; poorly preserved. Even worse, the scribe was stronger at calligraphy than at understanding the text; he is inattentive and makes a lot of mistakes. Parisinus (O), 9th century. The text is very close to extracts from Augustine, which he made at the beginning of the 6th century. monk Eugippius. Several more manuscripts from the 9th century belong to the same group. 3rd group, identified by the last publisher of the Confession, M. Scutella: Vaticanus – V 5756, IX-X centuries. The first complete edition of the works of St. Augustine was published in Basel in 1506. The edition undertaken by the Benedictine monks of the Congregation of St. Maurus (“Moorish edition”) remains in circulation to this day; its first volume, which contains the “Confession,” was published in Paris in 1679; the last one, XI - in 1700; This edition (with slight changes) was repeated in Patrologia Latina (Paris, 1845–1849). The Vienna Academy of Sciences undertook the publication of church writers; “Confession” was published in the 33rd volume in 1896. The text was prepared by P. Knoll, who overestimated the dignity of S and therefore made many mistakes. The latest edition of the Confession was prepared by M. Scutella; published in 1934 in Bibliotlioca Teubneriana. The newest translation was made from it by Doctor of Philology M. E. Sergeenko. Commented publications (only the newest ones are named): 1. K. von Raumer. Augustini Confessions. Güterloch, 1876, 2nd ed. 2. I. Gibb and W. Montgomery. Augustini Confessions. Cambridge, 1908. ibid. 2nd ed., 1927. 3. P. de L a b r i o 11 e. S. Augustini Confessions. Paris, 1933–1937. 4. Oeuvres de s. Augustin. Les Confessions. Introductions et notes par A. Solignac. Paris, 1962. These editions were used for notes. 1. The first Russian translation of the “Confession” was made by the hieromonk of the Trinity-Sergius Lavra, Fr. Agapit; published in 1733. For its time, this translation was excellent and to this day, despite the outdated language, has not lost its charm. Hieromonk Agapit knew Latin excellently, understood and was able to convey the power and peculiarity of the language of St. Augustine. 2. Translation of the Kyiv Theological Academy, ed. 3, part 1, Kyiv. 1914. 3. Anonymous translation, M., 1914. 4. The proposed translation of “On the Education of the Catechumens” in Russian is being published for the first time. Here is Harnack's characterization of Neoplatonism: “In Neoplatonism, Greek philosophy said its last word and left its testament... it collected everything that was sublime and noble that it acquired during its long work, and united it in a bold idealistic system and in a guide to the blessed life. In Neoplatonism, Greek philosophy taught that the only reality is God, and the only task is to rise to Him; she taught that evil is separation from God, that the sensory world is only an appearance and a likeness, that one can rise to God only through internal education and abstinence, through contemplation rising to higher and higher spheres, and, finally, through ecstasy, when God gives the soul the opportunity to see his light...” (Reden und Aufsätze, Bd. 1, S. 72, Giessen, 1904)