A Bond between Souls E-Book

Coleman M. Ford

• Herausgeber: Lexham Academic
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Serie: Studies in Historical and Systematic Theology
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 383

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2022

Beschreibung

Augustine's theology of friendship The discovery of Augustine's letters in the mid-twentieth century provided a watershed moment for understanding the bishop of Hippo. The letters of Augustine offer a window into his life. They showcase a theologian on the run, working through difficult pastoral issues. They also show another side of Augustine: the theologian as friend. In A Bond between Souls: Friendship in the Letters of Augustine, Coleman M. Ford examines Augustine's understanding of friendship. For Augustine, friendship is the overflow of love and is essential for building Christlike virtue. Friendship differs by context and relationship but is fundamentally rooted in the reality that, in Christ, friendship with God has been restored. In this sense, friendship is fundamentally a spiritual exercise. With original research rooting Augustine's letter-writing, theology, and understanding of friendship in antiquity, A Bond between Souls helps readers to understand this doctor of the church in a deeper way.

Leseprobe

A BOND BETWEEN SOULS

Friendship in the Letters of Augustine

COLEMAN M. FORD

STUDIES IN HISTORICAL AND SYSTEMATIC THEOLOGY

A Bond Between Souls: Friendship in the Letters of Augustine

Studies in Historical and Systematic Theology

Copyright 2022 Coleman M. Ford

Lexham Academic, an imprint of Lexham Press

1313 Commercial St., Bellingham, WA 98225

LexhamPress.com

You may use brief quotations from this resource in presentations, articles, and books. For all other uses, please write Lexham Press for permission.

Email us at [email protected].

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from the ESV® Bible (The Holy Bible, English Standard Version®), copyright © 2001 by Crossway Bibles, a publishing ministry of Good News Publishers. Used by permission. All rights reserved.

Scripture quotations marked (KJV) are from the King James Version. Public domain.

Print ISBN 9781683596509

Digital ISBN 9781683596516

Library of Congress Control Number 2022941541

Lexham Editorial: Todd Hains, Caleb Kormann, Abigail Stocker, John Barach, Mandi Newell

Cover Design: Brittany Schrock

To Michael Haykin for your ongoing friendship and encouragement

To Shawn Wilhite who has been an “other self” for many years

CONTENTS

Abbreviations

Foreword

Michael A. G. Haykin

Preface

1.Introduction

2.Augustine and Spiritual Friendship

3.Assessing Classical Models of Friendship

4.“Wounds From a Friend”

Jerome and Spiritual Friendship as Correction and Christian Love

5.Conversing on Heavenly Things

Spiritual Friendship as Mutual Encouragement in the Spiritual life

6.“Be Imitators of Them, as They Are of Christ”

Spiritual Friendship With Fellow Clergy

7.“Long For That Divine and Heavenly City”:

Spiritual Friendship as Civic Counsel in Augustine’s Epistolary Exchange with Roman Officials

8.Conclusion

Bibliography

Subject Index

Scripture Index

ABBREVIATIONS

ANF

Ante-Nicene Fathers

Acad.

Augustine, Contra Academicos (Against the Academics)

Bon. Conj.

Augustine, De bono conjugali (The Excellence of Marriage)

Conf.

Augustine, Confessionum libri XIII (Confessions)

CSEL

Corpus scriptorum ecclesiasticorum latinorum

Doctr. chr.

Augustine, De doctrina christiana (Teaching Christianity)

Enchir.

Augustine, Enchiridion de fide, spe, et caritate (Enchiridion on Faith, Hope, and Charity)

GRBS

Greek, Roman, and Byzantine Studies

Nat. grat.

Augustine, De natura et gratia (Nature and Grace)

NPNF

Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers

Nupt.

Augustine, De nuptiis et concupiscentia ad Valerium comitem (Marriage and Desire)

Off.

Ambrose, De officiis ministrorum

Retract.

Augustine, Retractationum libri II (Retractions)

Serm.

Augustine, Sermones

Tract. Ev. Jo.

Augustine, In Evangelium Johannis tractatus (Tractates on the Gospel of John)

Trin.

Augustine, De Trinitate (The Trinity)

FOREWORD

Michael A. G. Haykin

By any estimation, the experience and concept of friendship was central to the life and thought of the great patristic theologian Augustine. It is surprising, then, that the topic has not been studied in greater detail than it has. Might that be due to the way that friendship has not been an important area of reflection for many twentieth-century thinkers and authors (in recent years this has begun to change)? Numerous works on Augustine recognize its importance for understanding the African theologian, but it has certainly not received the attention it deserves. This new examination of the way that friendship informed Augustine’s life and thinking is therefore most welcome. There is far more to this subject than can be easily digested in a monograph such as this. But Dr. Coleman Ford is to be commended for laying out the key elements of friendship in the life of Augustine.

Of course, this was a great topic not only in Augustine’s life, but among the ancients in general. Both Plato and Aristotle, for example, regarded it as an essential subject for philosophical reflection, and Ford helpfully orients the reader to these classical perspectives on friendship before he takes us through some of the works of Augustine that relate to a number of his friendships. The range of Augustine’s friendships was impressive, from a prickly author like Jerome to significant Roman officials such as Marcellinus and Boniface. A study like this leaves one longing for more and maybe Dr. Ford could use this fine monograph as a vital stepping-stone to a more encyclopaedic work that deals with the entire range of friends in the life of the remarkable African theologian whose works have done so much to shape western thought.

Dundas, Ontario

October 22, 2021

PREFACE

My interest in church history blossomed in an introductory class at Dallas Theological Seminary under the tutelage of Jeffrey Bingham. My interest grew with subsequent seminars on specific topics in early Christianity, and even more so while serving as an assistant for Michael Svigel. As I considered the topic for my master’s thesis, I couldn’t escape my interest in the fourth century and was specifically intrigued by the life and ministry of Ambrose of Milan. Writing my thesis on the history and context of his hymnology, this naturally led me into Augustine and his relationship with Ambrose. Having finished the thesis and looking towards doctoral work, for whatever reason, I shelved my interest in Ambrose and Augustine and turned my sights to other figures and topics. Entering the doctoral program at Southern Seminary, I quickly fell in love with topics pertaining to patristic spirituality under the teaching and guidance of Michael Haykin. In this season, my appreciation for the Cappadocians, including figures such as Macarius Symeon, grew deep. Having entertained the possibility of writing on some aspect of one of these Greek thinkers, I simply could not find a place to land and felt as if I was drifting in an unfamiliar sea, unable to navigate to a safe harbor. This caused me to set my sights back on one of my original loves, Augustine of Hippo. Having continually read Confessions for devotional purposes, I simply could not escape his descriptions of friendship. Led by Michael Haykin, the notion of friendship in Augustine was refined and grew into a full-fledged research project which resulted in this book. It has been a labor of love.

With this in mind, there are many friends who have brought encouragement in the process of writing. First, I must thank Michael Haykin for the mentorship and friendship he has provided me in the course of my doctoral work. His desire for academic excellence is only matched by his grace and charity which he has consistently demonstrated to me as a student. Second, I must thank men such as Timothy Paul Jones, Jonathan Pennington, and Michael Wilder, who gave me a chance to work and serve alongside them while “training me up in the way I should go” when it came to ministry, whether academic or pastoral. Next, the numerous peers and friends who have encouraged and challenged me along the way must not go unmentioned. One group, my personal Cassiciacum cohort, includes friends like Garrick Bailey, Dustin Bruce, Jonathan Kiel, Brian Renshaw, Sam Tyson. I continue to go back to this group for spiritual sustenance and would not have come to this point without their friendship. I must also thank the various staff and members at The Village Church who encouraged me along the way as I have ministered amongst them while simultaneously writing my dissertation. Thank you for helping me see the beauty and grace of the gospel in new and refreshing ways. I also want to thank my colleagues and friends at Southwestern Seminary and Texas Baptist College who encourage and challenge me. In particular, Madison Grace has become an “other self” to me. Most especially, Shawn Wilhite has been the epitome of an “other self” in this journey and I will cherish the friendship we have though separated by fourteen hundred miles.

Finally, I must thank my family who have supported me spiritually, emotionally, and financially along the way. From my first day of seminary until now, you have been steady and unwavering in your consolation and reassurance. This, of course, includes my wife Alex who has walked alongside me in this journey from day one. Having been a steady friend who has seen my flaws and knows my weaknesses, she has continued to show Christlike grace, love, and kindness and has been the greatest encouragement of all. You have helped me define spiritual friendship because you have modeled it so well with your life. Thank you for helping make this possible.

Coleman M. Ford

Fort Worth, Texas

June 2022

1

INTRODUCTION

In his biography on Augustine, Possidius (fl. fifth century AD) recounted the regular judicial duties of his subject. He executed his obligations with care and, when possible, “he taught both parties the truth of divine Law” and “stressed its importance, and suggested means of obtaining eternal life.”1 While Augustine discharged this duty willingly, according to Possidius, “this work … took him away from better things.… His greatest pleasure was always found in the things of God, or in the exhortation or conversation of intimate brotherly friendship.”2 Here Possidius provided his readers with a portrait of a man who, among handling theological controversies and performing pastoral duties, demonstrated a deep love for divine reflection and friendly conversation. These two activities were rarely separated in the mind of Augustine. For Augustine, friendship was no mere casual relationship—true friends brought each other nearer to the face of God.

Augustine of Hippo (354–430) lived and moved within the context of Roman North Africa. Born to a father of Roman heritage and disposition and a mother of Berber descent with Christian commitments, Augustine’s pedigree exhibited a multicultural blend and reveals a man who paved the way for both doctrine and practice for the next millennium following his death. He lived at a key turning point in history and witnessed a cultural shift while embodying such a shift as well. Justo González rightly notes that Augustine served as a “bridge between the former Christian tradition and the new context and cultures.”3 He is one of the most explored figures within history in terms of theology, psychology, philosophy, and biblical interpretation (among other subjects), yet much remains to be explored in regard to his personal, pastoral, and spiritual life.4

Possidius’s remark noted earlier is a profound observation revealing the heart within such a multifaceted character. At the conclusion of his work he says, “[May] I emulate and imitate in this world that man, now dead, with whom by God’s grace, I lived intimately and pleasantly without any bitter disagreement for almost forty years. Having done this, I will enjoy with him in the world to come the promises of almighty God. Amen.”5 This remark demonstrates the profound impact of Augustine’s piety and friendship. It would seem that this intimate friendship motivated Possidius toward imitation of Augustine’s devotion to God. Friendship, therefore, was the channel in which piety was both to be pursued and modeled.

Now, significant reflection on friendship existed in antiquity. Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics contains two books on the topic of friendship. At the outset of book 8, he asserts, “For friendship is a virtue, or involves virtue; and also it is one of the most indispensable requirements of life. For no one would choose to live without friends, but possessing all other good things.”6 With regard to friendship, Augustine would certainly agree with many of the classical thinkers who preceded him. It is certain that his understanding of friendship was shaped in many ways by this classical foundation. His perception of and motivation for friendship, however, differed significantly from the classical ideal.

UNDERSTANDING AUGUSTINE AS FRIEND AND LETTER WRITER

James O’Donnell has remarked, “Least well represented in modern readings of Augustine are his letters.”7 Most revealingly, Peter Brown has noted how the letters of Augustine discovered by Johannes Divjak in 1969 caused him to rethink his view of Augustine.8 Robert Eno observed, “Letters were of vital importance for Augustine because friendship was essential to him.”9 The letter in antiquity served as a vehicle, or “living example,” wherein “the shared lives of teacher and student could best be communicated.”10 As Stanley Stowers notes, the letter bears the mark of the writer’s soul, especially as it developed in the fourth and fifth centuries among Christian writers.11 Augustine, along with Jerome, represents a “synthesis of classical rhetoric and Christian traditions” in regard to letter writing. The fourth and fifth centuries could rightly be called “the golden age of Christian letter writing.”12 Based on its necessity for communicating one’s soul to another, the letter was rightly seen as a natural means for developing and maintaining friendships. With this in mind, how should one see Augustine both as friend and letter writer?

AUGUSTINE AS FRIEND

As one considers friendship in Augustine, the mid-twentieth century marks the beginning of English scholarship on the topic.13 Reflecting on a large swathe of Augustine’s work, the earliest work focused more on his philosophy of friendship, including its theological and biblical emphases. Individual relationships were discussed, but only insofar as they contributed to the larger framework of Augustine’s thought. The nature of Christian friendship within the fourth century received a fuller treatment in the late twentieth century, with friendship in Augustine receiving a significant portion of reflection.14 Augustine and his specific relationships were now beginning to enter the conversation. The concept of friendship was also being wedged into the larger fabric of Augustine’s ethical and social thought, specifically how Augustine’s thought on friendship intersects with the related topics of family and the state.15

Within these discussions authors have also been concerned with how Augustine’s thought fits into the larger mold of philosophies of friendship. Authors over the past three or four decades have sought to relate Augustine’s concept of friendship to the broader Roman tradition, in particular, to Cicero’s On Friendship.16 Within this discussion too has arisen reflection on the political dynamics of friendship.17 Donald Burt has stated that Augustine “believed that our social nature is a true good. We are perfected as humans by our love for other humans. We are made happy when that love is returned, and the most important expression of such reciprocal love is the love of friendship.”18 It is true that Augustine’s notion of friendship was thoroughly influenced by the Roman tradition, yet with clear distinctions. Carolinne White noted that Augustine’s early concept of friendship was influenced by Ciceronian notions found particularly in On Friendship.19 In a letter written to an old friend, Martianus, Augustine explained how their friendship fulfills the Ciceronian description of “agreement on things human and divine along with good will and love.”20

According to Koenraad Verboven, “Friendship loomed large in the Roman mind, and was much reflected upon.”21 Augustine inherited a tradition of friendship within the genre of epistolography, particularly in the Latin West from Cicero up to his own time. While there is continuity with earlier traditions, there are also adaptions of ancient views of friendship found within Augustine’s letters. The lingua of friendship was thus adopted and then significantly adapted by Augustine to fit his specific Christian definition. Specifically, the Roman idea of patron-client relations informs much of the language of friendship in Roman era epistolography. Such friendships were “very unequal” and involved one being “morally bound” to another.22 Particularly within the late Republic and early Imperial Roman tradition, the notion of patron and client could still be considered a type of friendship or amicitia. That said, the ideal Roman friendship (amicitia) was a “voluntary relationship between two persons ideally based on affection but strongly regulated by ethical norms and social expectations.”23 A friendship could last for many years, even if a significant gap in wealth, status, and influence existed between a patron and his client.24 The language of friendship did not necessarily imply social or political equality, but was often preferred to that of patronage to avoid implications of “inferiority and dependency.”25 The idea of amicitia also had political undertones.26 The idea of amicitia and Roman friendship, particularly as it pertains to Cicero, will be explained more in chapter 2.

Augustine demonstrates his inheritance of the Roman lingua of friendship at various points within his letters, though he is quick to redefine such language in particularly Christian ways. As will be shown, Augustine presents a notion of Christian friendship as extending to all based on the dual command of love, and specific friendships as fulfilling the Ciceronian distinction of agreement in “all things human and divine,” yet transformed by grace and given a new eternal perspective based on mutual faith in Christ.27 In other words, Augustine perceives the obligation of friendship extended toward all humankind but the fulfillment of friendship among only those who share a common commitment to Christ.

AUGUSTINE AS LETTER WRITER

The first modern work on Augustine and his letters appeared in 1935.28 Information gleaned from Augustine’s letters pertaining to social life, economic realities, political movements, and life in Christianized Roman society in general was used as literary evidence to produce a more robust image of Augustine and his context. This study, however, amounts to social data rather than drawing connections to the greater matrix of Augustine’s thought. Later in the twentieth century, authors began looking to Augustine’s letters in order to demonstrate how he used them as a means of discipline.29 The idea of disciplina emerged as an operative factor in his pastoral leadership, as discerned from his letters. Augustine, in this reckoning, embraced the doctrine of the church as the standard for Christian conduct, including how to address misconduct. Other studies followed, shedding additional light upon Augustine’s letters as a corpus of work and how they functioned within doctrinal controversy.30 Assessing particular situations such as the Donatist schism as well as issues pertaining to Jerome and Augustine’s relationship showed Augustine as one concerned primarily with correcting error in his letter writing, a tactic unique in late antique epistolary communication. With these contributions in view, yet more work remains in using Augustine’s letters to understand particular facets of his thought, particularly his spirituality.

These studies affirmed the fact that letters in late antiquity often functioned as pieces of oratory, pieces of “public intimacy” often to be published and read aloud.31 Though the epistolary genre is somewhat difficult to define, in general letters were distinct from other texts in that they were written messages conveyed between a sender and recipient.32 The fact that Augustine’s letters were collected and preserved—both during his life and especially after his death—demonstrates their inherent value to the Christian community.33 Augustine himself was aware of how his letters would be a crucial component of his literary and theological legacy.34 As the earliest studies have noted, Augustine’s corpus of letters provide a wealth of biographical, social, historical, and theological information. As noted previously, he wrote as one who bared his soul to his recipient, yet he also did so as one trained in rhetoric. The art and practice of rhetoric was inherent in the Roman world, and thus it is not surprising that Augustine was deeply committed to the art of speaking, and hence writing, well. Augustine’s famous work on Christian teaching and doctrine, Teaching Christianity, demonstrates Augustine’s desire to see rhetoric transformed for the purpose of a convincing and compelling Christian oratory. Hence Charles Baldwin notes:

[The] great Christians of the fourth century, if they could not escape sophistic, at least redeemed it by curbing its extravagance and turning it to nobler uses. But Augustine did much more. He set about recovering for the new generation of Christian orators the true ancient rhetoric. He saw that for Christian preaching sophistic must not only be curbed; it must be supplanted.35

Augustine maintained the value of classical education, particularly rhetoric, yet desired to promote such learning for the distinct calling of Christian oratory. This desire for a particularly Christian rhetoric was also promoted within the pages of his numerous letters.

Calvin Troup notes that Augustine “never abandons rhetoric qua rhetoric in practice, but rejects only the abuses.”36 Augustine’s formation in and dedication to rhetoric is important to note as Augustine was not immune to rhetorical tropes such as hyperbole and allusion in order to demonstrate literary erudition. There was also a stock vocabulary of epistolography within late antiquity that Augustine freely accessed. Éric Rebillard notes the various “epistolary rituals” that Augustine observed as he undertook to write to various individuals.37 Similarly, Jaclyn Maxwell highlights the rhetorical culture of late antique Christian letter writers who “followed the conventions of letter writing, often including classical as well as Christian references.”38 Augustine was aware that his letters would have been read out loud as “[ancient] letters were not considered to be private correspondence.”39

In Teaching Christianity, Augustine commended traditional rhetorical training for Christian orators in order “to teach, to delight, and to sway.”40 Augustine’s letters must not be treated as if they were only candid portraits of personal biography, but as literary texts with rhetorical devices and complex contextual layers. As George Kennedy notes, Augustine encouraged Christian orators “to delight listeners in order to retain them as listeners and move them in order to impel them to do what is right.”41 This need to delight readers was not opposed to honesty, as a Christian orator was to live in accordance with the Scriptures that they expounded upon. Thus, Christian virtue must accompany and complement the orator.42 This dedication to virtuous character within the rhetorical act applied to Augustine’s epistolary life as well.

Even with this rhetorical and literary framework working within his thought, Augustine’s letters demonstrate a consistent inclination toward personal and spiritual connection. While Augustine was certainly a promoter of oratory and literary eloquence, his was an eloquence in service to truth and spiritual encouragement. Augustine would not tolerate eloquence for eloquence’s sake, for such a presentation focused attention on the speaker of the words rather than the words themselves. Thus, Augustine’s letters aim at spiritual motivation in service to the truth of Scripture and therefore range from occasional exchanges, to deeply personal exchanges, to book-length theological treatises. For Augustine, a letter was a conduit for spiritual conversation of all sorts.43

While Augustine remains a prominent figure in the history of the church, his concept of friendship in his epistolary literature remains relatively unexplored. Indeed, scholars have much more to understand from the bishop of Hippo from his letters alone. Though recent work has been done in this area, more can be said as to the specific nature of his relationships as expressed in his epistolary exchanges.44 Hence, this work seeks to fill the gap in understanding Augustine’s view of friendship as it is expressed, promoted, and practiced within his letters.

THESIS

In his letters, Augustine conceived of friendship as an outflow of Christian love, integral to the Christian life for the purpose of building Christlike virtue, yet shaped differently based on context and person. Specifically, the purpose of this work is to answer the following question: is there a relationship between friendship and spirituality in Augustine’s epistolary literature? Additionally, how did Augustine conceive of friendship as a means to spiritual growth? What was the spiritual essence of friendship according to Augustine? More specifically, how did this “spiritual friendship” play out in specific relationships? In a series of letters between Jerome and himself, the bishop of Hippo expressed the vital importance of developing friendship:

Oh, if I were only permitted, even if not living in the same house, at least nearby, frequently to enjoy in the Lord a pleasant conversation with you. But since God has not granted this, I ask that you strive to preserve, increase, and make perfect our being together in the Lord as much as we can be and not disdain to reply, however rarely.45

But it is a real reason for reproach among friends if we do not see our own satchel and fix our eyes on the knapsack of others, as Persius says. There remains for you only that you love one who loves you and that you, a youth in the field of scripture, do not challenge an old man.… Would that we deserved your embraces and that by conversation with each other we either learned something or taught something!46

In answering the primary research question, this book also addresses the following related questions: first, to what extent did Augustine hold to classical notions of friendship? Second, what is the nature and role of friendship in the spiritual life of Christians? Third, what makes the epistolary format unique to the development of friendship? Finally, what role do Scripture and the Spirit play in Augustine’s notion of friendship? Friendship was not static but dynamic and encompassed numerous facets since love necessitated different approaches to different situations. Despite its various manifestations, the core of friendship—a mutual desire for virtue and wisdom found in Christ—remained consistent. Thus, friendship for Augustine was a profoundly spiritual exercise. In this way, Augustine uniquely transformed classical notions of friendship in service to the Christian life. The letters are the foremost place to turn to in Augustine’s works to best understand his view and practice of spiritual friendship.

METHODOLOGY

The study will be an inductive analysis of Augustine’s epistolary literature, supplemented by other primary sources from Augustine, and further supplemented by relevant secondary sources. Particular attention will be given to topics of friendship, sanctification, and spirituality as they relate to Augustine. The Corpus Scriptorum Ecclesiasticorum Latinorum (CSEL) remains the primary Latin text of Augustine’s letters and will be cited occasionally when the Latin meaning bears weight upon the discussion.47 The Letters of Augustine, published within the Works of Augustine series by New City Press, will serve as the standard English translation for this project, though other translations will be consulted as needed.48 Other primary sources such as Augustine’s Confessions, On Christian Doctrine, On the Trinity, City of God, as well as his sermons will also be consulted. Additionally, Possidius’s biography of Augustine will provide helpful and occasional reflection.49 Along with other pertinent secondary sources, Brown’s definitive biography is also consulted regularly throughout.50

With respect to understanding friendship in antiquity, numerous primary sources will be consulted, including relevant works from Aristotle, Plato, Cicero, and Seneca. Specifically, Plato’s Lysis,51Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics (particularly book 8)52 and Cicero’s On Friendship53 will be pivotal in understanding classical notions of friendship. Scholarly sources related to friendship in antiquity will also be consulted.

Chapter 2 on Augustine and spiritual friendship draws from studies mentioned previously and offers some new insights focused primarily in his letters. This chapter will establish the framework for understanding the dynamics of friendship in Augustine’s letters as seen in subsequent chapters. New attention will be given to the nature of spiritual friendship in Augustine, and how it differs from classical ideas of friendship. This chapter also draws from other texts of Augustine so as to understand his spirituality as it relates to friendship. Thus, I will consult works pertaining to Augustine’s spirituality in general. Other chapters focusing on specific exchanges between Augustine and his friends draw mainly upon the primary source material and consult relevant secondary works where necessary.

2

AUGUSTINE AND SPIRITUAL FRIENDSHIP

“ ‘For now we have an agreement on things human and divine along with good will and love in Christ Jesus, our Lord, our truest peace.”

—Augustine to Martianus1

INTRODUCTION

Joseph Lienhard notes, “Augustine was the first Christian writer to elaborate a theory of Christian friendship.”2 Thus, friendship was to always play an important role in Augustine’s life. Peter Brown observes, “Augustine will never be alone.”3 John O’Meara indicates that “one of the remarkable features of Augustine’s character” was his ability to make and retain friends.4 Friends were highly valued and cherished, as his life and correspondence clearly demonstrate. His friendships were part of his story, with friends playing different parts within their mutual experiences.5 Again Brown can state, “Augustine was an imperialist in his friendships. To be a friend of Augustine’s meant only too often becoming a part of Augustine himself.”6 This “imperialism” was not however focused only on what his friends could provide for him, but his desire was for mutual encouragement in the Christian life.

This friendship played out in different ways, but always with the underlying goal of seeing Christian virtue further formed in the other as a demonstration of Christian love. This is what it meant to be one with another soul, to see the love of Christ formed in the other as he would want it formed in himself. This was not the case earlier in his life prior to conversion. Though his thought was always evolving, most noticeably upon his conversion to Christianity, the notion of friendship was something that Augustine never left behind. As Carolinne White notes, “[Augustine] remained true to the ideal of friendship, in one way or another constantly giving it a central place in his way of life and his theology.”7 His early relationships certainly displayed classical ideals inherited from Cicero, and he realized later that some of his early relationships were unhealthy based on a lack of Christian perspective. The famous example in Augustine’s life was the death of his unnamed friend describled in Confessions book 4. This friend was like a “second self” and the loss of him created a significant hole which Augustine struggled to fill.8 In his post-conversion relationships, particularly those contained within his epistolary literature, Augustine’s primary void had been filled; yet he longed to see friendship extended to others as a means of further filling up his heart and theirs with Christian love. Christ had entered in and had created a longing to see others be encouraged in the hope and love of Christ. These “other selves” were so because of the indwelling Spirit which had mutually been poured forth in their hearts. If this were not yet the case, Augustine prayed that it would be that which informed his desire to extend friendship.

Thus, for Augustine, letters served as not only vehicles of dialogue, but as a stimulus for friendship. Letters as an aid to friendship were certainly nothing new within the classical world. The review of classical notions of friendship in chapter three demonstrates a wealth of reflection prior to Augustine. Both in theory and in practice, classical conceptions of friendships were a significant influence upon Augustine. Regarding the influence of classical renderings of friendship, Marie Aquinas McNamara notes, “[Using] it as a scaffolding he arrived at a notion of friendship which is entirely Christian and reaches beyond time to eternity itself.”9 As will be seen below, Augustine was very much dependent upon classical (specifically Ciceronian) understanding of friendship. Augustine found much agreement with Cicero’s definition of friendship. Friends think alike on a number of issues both earthly and divine, as Cicero maintained. Yet for Augustine, there was much more than mere agreement. Friendship is a union of hearts (concordia).10 This union had its foundation in humanity’s created origin.11

Joseph Clair concludes his study on Augustine’s notion of the good within his letters and sermons with this observation:

To help others discern the good requires that one become a friend—to welcome others within the sphere of one’s self-love, and to experience others’ questions and problems as one’s own. Morality is ultimately about friendship, for Augustine. For it is the temporal good of genuine friendship that is the greatest foretaste of eternal good—the singular site where the unchangeable good appears within human existence.12

Thus, friendship was a multivalent relationship embarked upon for the purpose of helping the other discern the good. At the center was love. It was a transforming love, seeking to make an enemy into a friend. It was a sustaining love, tending to the flame of love long present within a dear friend. It was a refining love, contending with a like-minded soul in order to build and preserve a fragile friendship. Friendship expressed itself in Augustine’s many relationships as a robust and, at times, demanding lattice of love. Spiritual friendship, as I have demonstrated and shall further explore, was singularly focused on one task: building and helping maintain Christlike virtue. This required a different approach with each person, or group of people, in order to meet their spiritual needs.

THE SPIRITUALITY OF AUGUSTINE

Pivotal to understanding spiritual friendship in Augustine’s letters is the way in which he viewed the Christian life in general. Humility and love—for God and for neighbor—were the essential components of Augustine’s spirituality. In writing to a student named Dioscorus, Augustine asserted, “that first way [to truth] … is humility; the second way is humility, and the third way is humility.”13 For Augustine, practicing true humility meant that one’s heart must be focused in the proper direction. It was a life of “radical dependence.”14 Humility, therefore, was impossible to achieve without love. Love and humility are inseparable in that true humility guarantees the practice of true love.

Thomas Martin notes that for Augustine, “Love transforms humility, making it redemptive; humility transforms love, making it universal.”15 Humility opens us to God; pride removes our capacity to love God. The grace of God is necessary to transform our wills, making us able to choose God’s will out of love and with joy.16 Christian love is inspired by divine love and seeks to mirror it. Love as a gift of God endows the human will with a new desire, a striving for the things of God including truth, wisdom, and the virtues of Christ. Such love excludes possessive or egotistic love, pretension, and self-glorification. From this transformation, spiritual practices such as prayer and loving others seek to further instill God’s love while one continually humbles oneself before him. The Holy Spirit propels people to the love of their neighbor. A human being’s capacity to love God comes from God alone, and by this divinely inspired love one should love the neighbor.17 All such attitudes are furthered through humility, knowing that love for others demands that one cast aside one’s own desires for the sake of the other. True love consists in loving others with God’s love given by the Holy Spirit.18

FRIENDSHIP AS CHRISTIAN LOVE

Paul Wadell describes Christian friendship according to Augustine as a “school in Christian love.”19 While Augustine believed that he experienced friendship with his unnamed friend in book 4 of the Confessions, the fact that it was neither centered on Christ nor directed toward God made it an incomplete friendship. Romans 5:5 serves as a defining passage for Augustine’s view of friendship. Reflecting on the death of this friend Augustine stated, “But in childhood he was not such a friend as he became later on, and even later on ours was not a true friendship, for friendship cannot be true unless you solder it together among those who cleave to one another by the charity poured forth in our hearts by the Holy Spirit, who is given to us.”20 Thus for Augustine, true friendship occurred when one loved the good in another person, with the good being a reflection of God in that person.21 This sort of love gravitates toward the other because of the inherent good they contain as creatures made in God’s image.

That Augustine owes much to the classical tradition for his conception of friendship will be explained in the following chapter. As White relates, he demonstrated a “continued attachment to such ideas and shared interests, and by his persistence in using the traditional, classical language relating to friendship.”22 This classical influence, though never fully jettisoned, received a thorough Christian immersion, with friendship given a new orientation within the Christian’s journey to God. McNamara has helpfully provided the categories in which Augustine views friendship.23 Unique to Augustine was his view that friends and friendship are a gift from God. Whereas Aristotle would assert that people choose friends based on the virtue they see in others, Augustine viewed friends as those who are placed in one’s lives for the purpose of seeking God together. With this in mind, friendships that have their genesis with God must find their source in God, be conformed to his will, and be mutually seeking his face. Friendship is infused with grace based on the pouring out of the Spirit’s love. It originates with the Spirit and propels the friends on toward friendship in God’s kingdom where all will be friends as they share in true friendship with God.

LOVE AND AMICITIA

Augustine asserted that a friend was loved based on God’s presence within them.24 White has noted how Augustine retains the classical notion of amicitia in his idea of friendship. That said, the ideas of caritas and its related words of amor and dilectio are evident throughout Augustine’s letters. However, the relationship between caritas to amicitia is not always clear in notions of friendship. Can amicitia, with its particular nature, accommodate the more universal notion of caritas in Christian conception? Lienhard remarks, “Augustine never made his ideas simple by ignoring his experience, and his experience taught him that friendship meant a good deal more than fraternal charity.”25

Caritas is granted by the Holy Spirit through grace. It is thus the binding agent for friendship. This reflection describes the second period of Augustine’s conception of friendship, the first being the period from Cassiciacum up until the Confessions where “human sympathy” is seen as the source of friendship.26 This second period applies to Augustine’s epistolary interaction, wherein love is the central “fact at the heart of Augustine’s view of friendship.”27 Thus the relationship of caritas to amicitia is melded together in Augustine’s letters, caritas being the lived component of amicitia, which in turn is extended to all in an effort of exhibiting the transforming love of God. Sometimes this connection was more generic, as in the love due to all mankind which is expressed in friendship.28 Other times, the connection was much more precise.29 In writing to Martianus, he consistently related the idea of goodwill and mutual love from Cicero (benevolentia et caritate consensio) to the notion of amicitia.30 But Augustine’s notion of love derived from God and, specifically, was Trinitarian in shape.

TRIUNE LOVE

This also demonstrates that friendship is necessarily rooted in the Triune nature of God. Whereas Cicero would define friendship as agreement in all things human and divine, Augustine would further define the divine character of friendship based on the inner relations of the Triune God. Human friendship can only properly begin from the perspective of Trinitarian love. The center of Christian friendship is the Spirit, that Trinitarian bond of love, which is available to believers since the Spirit has been poured forth in their hearts.31 This love binds friends together and is the means of mutual transformation. As McNamara notes, “God is the end as He is the beginning of all true friendship.”32

Grace is essential within Christian friendship according to Augustine. This quality sets Christian friendship apart from pagan ideals centered on the value of natural virtue. Thus, simply agreeing on human things a true friendship does not make. This transforming grace is focused heavenward. While grace produces an experience of temporal love, its primary purpose is to carry one along and prepare one for God’s eternal city. This makes Christian friendship the only true friendship as it provides the pathway toward the “telos for which everyone is made.”33 The perfect love and benevolence experienced at the culmination of all things when God will be all in all is both the goal and example for authentic friendship. Friendship, for Augustine, is the context where this eternity-focused love is learned and practiced. Christian friendship is not a hindrance but a vehicle toward obtaining this eternal love. Friendship has always been connected to community, whether that is the polis in classical rendering or a philosophical community represented by a group such as the Epicureans or Stoics. Similarly, Augustine views friendship in communal terms, with its ultimate fulfillment in the eschaton.

A DEBT OF LOVE OWED TO ALL

Numerous times throughout his letters, Augustine expressed an idea of mutual love shared between him and his friends. He often described this as a “debt” that each one owed to the other. Evodius wrote Augustine to collect on this “debt.”34 In his letters to the deacon and eventual bishop of Rome, Celestine, Augustine described a certain “debt of love” that was owed based on a mutual affection for the other person.35 This kind of love recognizes that love is owed to another based on their innate qualities as a human, and hence love is owed to friends but also to enemies. This love, Augustine asserted, seeks to transform one’s enemy “whom we truly love to become a friend.”36

The idea of transforming love is similar to the idea expressed to his friend Proba. Though Augustine recognized that friendship is most intimately expressed between two who share the same love for God, this did not mean that friendship should be reserved for an elite few. There must be an openness to friendship, even to those who we may deem enemies, for love is due all. For Augustine, extending friendship to all was a gesture which acknowledged our common human nature. It was a call to join the journey toward the eternal city of God where friendship finds its culmination. The idea of universal friendship is expressed in his letter to Proba. He asserted,

The health and friendship of a human being are sought for their own sake.… Likewise, friendship should not be bounded by narrow limits, for it embraces all to whom we owe affection and love, though it is inclined more eagerly toward some and more hesitantly toward others. It, however, extends even to enemies, for whom we are also commanded to pray. Thus there is no one in the human race to whom we do not owe love, even if not out of mutual love, at least on account of our sharing in a common nature.37

Friendship is the means by which we can demonstrate the love which Christians are called to exhibit.

Noting the “practical impossibility” of being friends with all, Donald Burt says that for Augustine this means that one should desire universality as a goal. While it is impossible to meet every human in one’s lifetime, “we can strive to make every human we meet a friend.”38 This was Augustine’s posture and his encouragement to his friends. Augustine extended the hand of friendship as a means to love and bring others to the truth. Those who are not yet true spiritual friends, Augustine believed, one should love and befriend with the hope that they will one day be counted among the true friends in the eternal city of God.

Friendship as a debt of love to all is also evident in the way Augustine viewed friendship in its eternal perspective. Friendship in Augustine, according to McNamara, was a sign of the love that is to come in God’s eschatological kingdom. The coming kingdom is a realized state, not a termination, of friendship. McNamara notes, “His ideal was to have the unity which is an integral part of individual friendship reign among all men joined in fraternal charity.”39 This concept comes out in numerous ways throughout Augustine’s letters, especially those written to civic officials. Augustine encouraged those in public office to view their work as reflective of their commitment to God’s heavenly city. Due to their friendship with God, they were better equipped to befriend others and work for the common good of the earthly city.

LOVING GOD AND OTHERS

As mentioned previously, much of Augustine’s spirituality has to do with how to integrate the dual command to love into the Christian life. Our love for others, the foundation of friendship, is grounded in the love of God.40 In writing to Proba, Augustine framed the universal love owed to all as the basis of Christian friendship. This was a transforming type of love, based on common human nature, which sought to turn enemies into true friends who would in turn be transformed by the effects of God’s love. Augustine asserted, “In him we, of course, love ourselves if we love God, and by the other commandment we truly in that way love our neighbors as ourselves if we bring them, to the extent we can, to a similar love of God. We, therefore, love God on account of himself and love ourselves and our neighbors on account of him.”41

FRIENDSHIP AS NECESSARY FOR HAPPINESS

Burt observes, “Augustine was convinced that human beings cannot enjoy the fullness of happiness in this life and in the next if they are by themselves, if there is no one they care about or anyone cares for them.”42 Indeed, as Augustine once remarked, “It is hard to laugh when you are by yourself.”43 With this in mind, Augustine views friendship as essential for happiness. Indeed, friendship indicates the type of relationship that all humanity will have in heaven with one another and with God.44 Friendship in a temporal sense is a foretaste of this heavenly friendship and contributes to our earthly happiness as it prepares us for eternal bliss. This design of friendship is woven into the fabric of our being. In his treatise The Excellence of Marriage, Augustine begins by stating the vitality of friendship within society: “Every human being is part of the human race, and human nature is a social entity, and has naturally the great benefit and power of friendship. For this reason, God wished to produce all persons out of one, so that they would be held together in their social relationships not only by similarity of race, but also by the bond of kinship.”45 That initiating relationship of husband and wife is first and foremost one of friendship. God ordained such a relationship as it contributed to happiness and human flourishing, increasing our joy.

FRIENDS ENCOURAGING HAPPINESS

Human beings exist with a desire for happiness. This desire must be “good” according to Augustine, since it was clear God made humanity this way and God only creates that which is good.46