tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407783074290571587.post5669690257386831294..comments2024-02-14T14:04:43.435+01:00Comments on Martin in Broda: Darüber, Augustinus zu lesenMartininBrodahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/13367467039848677931noreply@blogger.comBlogger6125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407783074290571587.post-69064616920984066512009-09-01T04:51:13.019+02:002009-09-01T04:51:13.019+02:00Translation - part 4
That’s exactly the way Augus...Translation - part 4<br /><br />That’s exactly the way Augustine saw it:<br /><br />„They say that human nature is free so that they do not seek a deliverer to set it free; they say that human nature is saved so that they judge a saviour unnecessary. For they say that it has such a great capability that, once it received its own powers in the beginning when it was created , it could by free choice, with no further help from the grace of him who created it, subdue and extinguish all desires and overcome all temptations.“<br />Letter 177,1<br /><br />Thus he accuses the Pelagians, who have certainly resolute contradicted, with their theory of the grace of God they would oppose to them and were addicted to the hubris of human self empowerment. One cannot find without the assistance of God to true life. Thus he doesn’t want to oppress the human mind, but he wanted to protect and help it. So certainly not a for a long time outdated affair.<br /><br />One of the numerous legends about Augustine told, he was wandering along on the banks of the sea and startled of his thinking because of a little boy, who scooped water with a spoon from the sea and poured it into a sand pit. When he asked him, what he was doing there, he answered: “The same that you do! You want to exploit the unfathomableness of God with your thoughts - I try to exhaust the sea!” It’s a bit like that with him.<br /><br />Probably one of the reasons why this contribution lasted for such a long time and not already was to read past Friday here. But if even Pope John Paul II determines (http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/john_paul_ii/apost_letters/documents/hf_jp-ii_apl_26081986_augustinum-hipponensem_en.html) -<br /><br />„It is difficult to venture forth upon the sea of Augustine's thought, and even more difficult to summarize it-this indeed is almost impossible.“<br /><br />- then this is probably not that strange.MartininBrodahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13367467039848677931noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407783074290571587.post-26215178315982031282009-09-01T03:29:37.393+02:002009-09-01T03:29:37.393+02:00Translation- part 3
He was someone, whose company...Translation- part 3<br /><br />He was someone, whose company other were looking for and he could give company, someone who was capable for friendship, an unpretentious saint probably. And like that was his faith. For Augustine the faith does belong to the most inside of a man, faith is not subjecting under an exterior power, but „homo desiderium dei“ - „a man is the longing after God” or „man is the longing of God”, you can translate it into both directions and both are true.<br /><br />Therefore he probably referred like no one since St. Paul to the grace of God, grace as caritas (Romans 5.5 „And hope maketh not ashamed; because the love of God is shed abroad in our hearts by the Holy Ghost which is given unto us“), and caritas means for him also will to the truth and for right and helping acting.<br /><br />And now we’re nevertheless at the original sin again. One of the most violent arguments - and he could be an embittered opponent - he had with Pelagius and his supporters. Briefly said, Pelagius had the opinion the Fall of Man was a fault for human nature, but more as a bad model. In principle the sin is superable and from there a Christian should and can aim a life without sin.<br /><br />In the “Confessio Augustana“, the “Augsburg Confession“ of 1530 (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augsburg_Confession or http://www.ctsfw.edu/etext/boc/ac) we hear:<br /><br />"Article II: Of Original Sin. <br /> <br />Also they teach that since the fall of Adam all men begotten in the natural way are born with sin, that is, without the fear of God, without trust in God, and with concupiscence; and that this disease, or vice of origin, is truly sin, even now condemning and bringing eternal death upon those not born again through Baptism and the Holy Ghost. <br />They Condemn the Pelagians and others who deny that original depravity is sin, and who, to obscure the glory of Christ's merit and benefits, argue that man can be justified before God by his own strength and reason."MartininBrodahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13367467039848677931noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407783074290571587.post-48759640288010500372009-09-01T02:08:54.154+02:002009-09-01T02:08:54.154+02:00Translation - part 2
„For, although I took no tro...Translation - part 2<br /><br />„For, although I took no trouble to learn what he said, but only to hear how he said it—for this empty concern remained foremost with me as long as I despaired of finding a clear path from man to thee--yet, along with the eloquence I prized, there also came into my mind the ideas which I ignored; for I could not separate them.“<br />Confessions V, 14<br /><br />He speaks here about Bishop Ambrose, whose rhetorical abilities fascinated him and they caused he came nearer to Christianity again. Augustine had apart from a keen mind a strong sense of beauty. Nevertheless he writes about it:<br /><br />„Belatedly I loved thee, O Beauty so ancient and so new, belatedly I loved thee. For see, thou wast within and I was without, and I sought thee out there. Unlovely, I rushed heedlessly among the lovely things thou hast made. Thou wast with me, but I was not with thee. These things kept me far from thee; even though they were not at all unless they were in thee. Thou didst call and cry aloud, and didst force open my deafness. Thou didst gleam and shine, and didst chase away my blindness. Thou didst breathe fragrant odors and I drew in my breath; and now I pant for thee. I tasted, and now I hunger and thirst. Thou didst touch me, and I burned for thy peace.“<br />Confessiones X, 27<br /><br />For such sentences he was accused to have carried Platonism into the Christian faith. But one could also say he knocked a bit the dust of the road from the dresses of Christian thinking, not as the first by the way, but surely as the most successful one. At Augustine one has the feeling - besides all the outstanding greatness - to speak with a contemporary, someone, to say it a bit clumsy, we have the same psychological constitution with, the same interests, temptations, and wrong ways. With one it’s possible to have a nice conversation with a cup of tea about esoteric nonsense.<br /><br />“Thus I fell among men, delirious in their pride, carnal and voluble, whose mouths were the snares of the devil--a trap made out of a mixture of the syllables of thy name and the names of our Lord Jesus Christ and of the Paraclete. These names were never out of their mouths, but only as sound and the clatter of tongues, for their heart was empty of truth. Still they cried, “Truth, Truth,” and were forever speaking the word to me. But the thing itself was not in them.”<br />Confessions III, 6MartininBrodahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13367467039848677931noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407783074290571587.post-32405039265567386472009-09-01T01:16:15.616+02:002009-09-01T01:16:15.616+02:00Reading Augustine
Translation
If someone wants to...Reading Augustine<br />Translation<br /><br />If someone wants to write about him airily, he could say, he is the man, who invented the original sin.<br /><br />“Thou hast prompted him, that he should delight to praise thee, for thou hast made us for thyself and restless is our heart until it comes to rest in thee.”<br />Confessions I, 1<br /><br />But why one should want that. He is like a mountain, at which one runs along, in order to get somehow a perfect picture, but with each step the picture changes, it remains always outstandingly. That has something intimidating, but just so long, until one begins to read, then he feels a surprising intimacy, mostly.<br /><br />„Turn back to yourself, inside humans lives the truth, and if you discover that your nature is changeable, go beyond you. “<br />De vera religione 39,72<br /><br />To have a brief look at his biography (you better look here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Augustine_of_Hippo):<br /><br />He was born on November 13th 354 in the city of Thagaste (today Souk Ahras in Algeria) as a son of Patricius (a pagan) and Monica (a devout Catholic Christian). He begins to study in 370 in Carthage; his concubine bears a son in 372, Adeodatus. The reading of “Hortensius” from Cicero inspires him for philosophy, the Bible satisfies him not that much, in 373 he became a Manichean, in 383 he broke with them. Since 375 a rhetoric teacher in Thagaste, he moves 383 to Rome and became in 384 a professor of rhetoric for the imperial court at Milan. In August of 386 he experiences an awakening and epiphany. Ambrose baptized Augustine on Easter Vigil in 387, and soon after Monica’s death in 388 he returns to Thagaste, where in 389 his son dies. In 391 he was ordained a priest and becomes in 396 bishop of Hippo Regius. On August 28th 430 Augustine dies during the siege of Hippo by the Vandals.MartininBrodahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13367467039848677931noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407783074290571587.post-13420571091920015702009-08-31T14:51:14.504+02:002009-08-31T14:51:14.504+02:00It’s just a pic from the day as always, I could ha...It’s just a pic from the day as always, I could have used a pic from my Sunday cooking at the post, but that seems not really appropriate. And since one joke is worth another, you know Titus, 1, 15.<br /><br />:-)MartininBrodahttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13367467039848677931noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5407783074290571587.post-39351063675812804882009-08-31T13:21:23.276+02:002009-08-31T13:21:23.276+02:00Does the beach volleyball net mean you did that po...Does the beach volleyball net mean you did that post while playing ball?*g* Propz PilgrimPilgrimhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/10302358349617667455noreply@blogger.com