The Incomprehensibility of God
Augustine as a Negative Theologian
By (author) P. van Geest
Augustine’s way of speaking about God has been frequently deplored. It has been dismissed as too confident regarding the content of its assertions and too narrowly confined. The reception of Augustine’s work appears to indicate that there was not a little truth to this view. Augustine’s affirmative statements on God’s essence and activities constituted the ‘initial capital’ of Christian theology and spirituality.In contemporary religion, a tendency is in evidence to deny that too specific an image of God can really contain absolute truth. Fully formulated religious truths have to be placed in perspective, or must even be deconstructed, especially if the suspicion arises that they inhibit openness to authentic religious experiences of unity and harmony. Given such an outlook on religion, it seems understandable that those who take contemporary culture’s renewed interest in religion seriously ignored Augustine’s work as an authoritative source for ‘post-christian’ discourse about God.The presupposition of this book is that, throughout his life, Augustine maintained a balance between speaking about God and remaining silent about him to a much greater extent than has often been realized. On the one hand, as a priest and a bishop, he wished to prevent misunderstandings concerning the nature of God’s essence and activity. On the other hand, as a young priest, he already showed his concern to drive home to the faithful the idea that God was a mystery.If Augustine positioned himself at the cutting edge of speaking and remaining silent, then his work is once more of importance for the future of the Christian faith, because it recognizes that the tension between affirmative and negative discourse about God has been characteristic of the Christian tradition from time immemorial.
- By (author) P. van Geest
Other Titles in this Series
New Themes, New Styles in the Eastern Mediterranean
Christian, Jewish, and Islamic Encounters, 5th-8th Centuries
Volume 16
Inside and Out
Interactions between Rome and the Peoples on the Arabian and Egyptian Frontiers in Late Antiquity
Volume 8
Apocalypticism and Eschatology in Late Antiquity
Encounters in the Abrahamic Religions, 6th-8th Centuries
Volume 17
L’écriture de l’histoire en syriaque
Transmissions interculturelles et constructions identitaires entre hellénisme et islam. Avec des répertoires des textes historiographiques en annexe
Volume 12
Empire, Church and Society in the Late Roman Near East
Greeks, Jews, Syrians and Saracens (Collected Studies, 2004-14)
Volume 10
En Route to the Confessions
The Roots and Development of Augustine's Philosophical Anthropology
Volume 6
The Ladder of Prayer and the Ship of Stirrings
The Praying Self in Late Antique East Syrian Christianity
Volume 22
New Approaches to Sidonius Apollinaris
With Indices on Helga Köhler, C. Sollius Apollinaris Sidonius: BriefeBuch I
Volume 7
Writing to Survive. A Commentary on Sidonius Apollinaris, Letters Book 7. Volume 1
The Episcopal Letters 1-11
Volume 2
Writing to Survive. A Commentary on Sidonius Apollinaris, Letters Book 7. Volume 2
The Ascetic Letters 12-18
Volume 14
Similar Books
‘For You I Study, For You I Work, For You I Live, For You I Am Ready To Even Give My Life’
Essays in Honour of Francis (Frank) J Moloney, SDB
A Late Antique Harrowing of Hell and Its Medieval Reception
Eusebius of Alexandria's Sermons 15 and 17 (CPG 5524; 5526) and their Latin Rewritings
Volume 99
Drunk the Potion, No Whit Charmed
The Doctrine of Pure and Perfect Souls from Iamblichus to Damascius
Extracanonical Traditions and the Holy Land
Texts, Rituals, and Material Culture in Late Antique Palestine
Fear, Fear of God, God-Fearers
Philological and Historical Perspectives on the World of Ancient Judaism and Christianity
Late Antique villae in the Balkans (3rd–7th c. AD): Current Research Questions and Perspectives
HAEMUS Companion to the Late Antique Balkans 1
Volume 4
Legal Visuality
Exegesis, Ambiguity, and Dissimulation of the Donation of Constantine in the Early Modern Period
Liturgia semper reformanda
Adaptations and accommodations in the liturgy in light of canon 838 of the Code of Canon Law
Nurturing the Elite
Representations of Drinking, Eating, and Religious Vessels in Palmyrene Funerary Iconography
Volume 13
Pre-Christian Religions, Rituals, and Beliefs in Central and Northern Europe
Interdisciplinary Investigations
Volume 5
The Therapeutae as the Best Paradigm for the Contemplative Life
A Contextual Reading of Philo of Alexandria's De Vita Contemplativa
