LISTSERV FILENAME: MCWILLIA COYLE LISTSERV LOCATION: Listserv@acadvm1.uottawa.ca FTP FILENAME: augustine-from-rhetor-to-theologian-review.txt FTP LOCATION: panda1.uottawa.ca directory /pub/religion/ _______________________________________________________________ The Religious Studies Publications Journal - CONTENTS REVIEW: _Augustine: From Rhetor to Theologian_ - FULL TEXT _______________________________________________________________ Volume 2.001a ISSN 1188-5734 _______________________________________________________________ January 12, 1992 McWilliam, Joanne, ed. _Augustine: From Rhetor to Theologian_. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 1992. Pp. x + 237. Cloth. $29.95. (This review will be printed in _The Toronto Journal of Theology_.) Here are fifteen of thirty-one papers presented at a Toronto conference (Trinity College, 1987) to mark the sedecentenary of the conversion/baptism of Augustine of Hippo. In "Augustine, Symmachus, and Ambrose" (pp. 7-13) T.D. Barnes demonstrates that Ambrose and Symmachus may have been first cousins. Kenneth B. Steinhauser ("The Literary Unity of the <>," pp. 15-30) argues anew for the unity of Augustine's best-known work. Jamie Scott takes a different approach to the <> as autobiography ("From Literal Self-Sacrifice to Literary Self- Sacrifice: Augustine's <> and the Rhetoric of Testimony," pp. 31-49). Colin Starnes ("Augustine's Conversion and the Ninth Book of the <>," pp. 51-63) affirms that Augustine, converted simultaneously to Neoplatonism and Christianity, described the Ostia vision to differentiate between the divine as experienced by the philosopher and by the Christian. Roland J. Teske ("'Homo Spiritualis' in the <> of St. Augustine," pp. 67-76) sees Augustine proposing Neoplatonism as Christianity's privileged expression: a <>, a term taken from Paul (and including him!), is one who both belongs to the church and espouses Neoplatonism. Two papers address the debate over historical veracity in the <>. J.J. O'Meara ("Augustine's <>: Elements of Fiction," pp. 77-95) argues that the work is not autobiographical, but belongs to the genre of the <>; this need not impugn the work's general historicity, though there is a "considerable element of fiction" in the narrative which conveys it. Leo Ferrari ("Beyond Augustine's Conversion Scene," pp. 97- 107) proposes that "the <> became the charter for Augustine's doctrine of divine predestination" (p. 105). R.D. Crouse directs us to Augustine's influence on Boethius and Eriugena ("Augustinian Platonism in Early Medieval Theology," pp. 109-20), seen primarily in the link of trinitarian notion of the divine with creation theory. James Wetzel addresses the development of Augustine's theology of grace ("Pelagius Anticipated: Grace and Election in Augustine's <>,"pp. 121-32), which <>, written before the Pelagian controversy, "invites us to consider... as something more than the artifact of a protracted and sometimes rancorous debate" (p. 122). William S. Babcock ("The Human and the Angelic Fall: Will and Moral Agency in Augustine's City of God", pp. 133-49) discusses a problem arising from Augustine's view of the first human sin: if Adam and Eve were responsible for it, how did their will first become evil? In "Goodness as Order and Harmony in Augustine" (pp. 151-9), Peter Slater affirms how, to the traditional conception of gradations of beings composed of spirit and matter, Augustine added two conclusions essential for his solution of the problem of evil. J. Patout Burns contributes to an area still needing much study: the early development of Christian pneumatology ("Christ and the Holy Spirit in Augustine's Theology of Baptism," pp. 161-71). Michael Fahey ("Augustine's Ecclesiology Revisited," pp. 173-81) reviews publications from 1861 to 1979 on Augustine's theology of church. The thirty-six items indicate shifts during that period within ecclesiology itself, from "the worst of isolationist theologizing" (p. 174) in early examples, to, in recent works, a focus "on the trinitarian, mystery dimension of Augustine's view of the Church rather than on any apologetic, institutional preoccupation" (p. 178). Joanne McWilliam offers an overview of studies of Augustine's theology of Christ ("The Study of Augustine's Christology in the Twentieth Century", pp. 183- 205), by theme rather than by chronology. Finally, Thomas Halton provides ("Augustine in Translation: Achievements and Further Goals," pp. 207-29), a list not only of Augustine's works translated in our time into English, but also of modern French, Spanish and Italian collections of his works. This list is followed by one of recent translations, editions and studies of individual Augustinian writings. The organizers of the Toronto conference deserve praise for gathering so many prestigious Augustinian scholars, among whom several Canadians may be counted (eight of them here), and for leaving us with a volume whose every article contributes to an aspect of <>. Notes follow each chapter and there is a subject index at the end. The volume is on the whole pleasingly presented. There are, however, not a few printing errors, particularly in the omission of accents for foreign (usually French) words. J. Kevin Coyle Saint Paul University Ottawa ______________________________________________________________________ The Religious Studies Publications Journal - CONTENTS is an electronic journal that archives and disseminates research and pedagogical material of relevance to Religious Studies. Its goal is to provide free FTP and LISTSERV archiving of quality scholarly material and to also provide a comprehensive directory of network accessible resources for Religious Studies in a wide variety of mediums. Electronic subscriptions are free: to subscribe, send a mail message to Listserv@uottawa or listserv@acadvm1.uottawa.ca with the text: SUBSCRIBE CONTENTS your name. Inquires regarding the CONTENTS project should be sent to the project director: Michael Strangelove Department of Religious Studies University of Ottawa 177 Waller, Ottawa K1N 6N5 (FAX 613-564-6641) <441495@Uottawa> or <441495@Acadvm1.Uottawa.CA>