What is the content of Augustine's theory of human nature?

Augustine was born in 3541October1KLOC-0/3rd in Taggart, North Africa, and is now the Algerian city of Sukahras. His father patrice is a heretic. Although he is not rich, he has a certain social status. His mother Monica is a devout Christian. It is generally believed that Augustine inherited his father's passion and his mother's gene of pursuing God and religious belief.

When Leo first arrived in Carthage, he was completely lost. (Comment on Biography 289)

First, indulge in life, live with others and have a son. Shows his sensitivity and rich feelings. Diduoxiang dispelled the jade meteorite and killed himself with a sword. Tears for the girl's lovelorn suicide.

Second, join a cult organization. Insist. It's not that I didn't get to the point. I studied Cicero's book Horton Sius. Referring to the Bible, I began to study the essence and root of evil. I joined Manichaeism because I didn't get a good answer. Good and evil are binary, and people have no moral responsibility. This theory just explains why Leo sometimes feels that his strong lust often makes him involuntarily. This made Augustine, who was unwilling to give up physical enjoyment and was condemned by his heart, very happy and accepted this theory.

Russell: He is a passionate man. He was quite bohemian when he was young, but an inner impulse prompted him to seek truth and justice.

When I returned to my hometown to start my teaching career-Carthaginian eloquence (I failed to get a satisfactory answer when discussing good and evil with Bishop Mani, and my faith began to waver)-Rome-Milan (I knew Aberossi and began to approach Christianity)-the miracle of the garden. Don't indulge in debauchery, lewdness and jealousy of competition. Obey the Lord Jesus, and don't indulge the lust of the flesh. Finally converted to Christianity. On Easter in 387, his son was baptized together in Milan and formally joined Christianity. 33 years old. On the one hand, he publicized his teachings, on the other hand, he wrote books and made statements, which had a great influence. In 396, he became bishop of Xibe diocese. In 430, Wang Daren invaded North Africa and died in the siege. His body is now buried in St. Peter's Cathedral in Rome.

repent

It's kind of an autobiography. Classical Latin means "admit, confess". In church terminology, it translates into "confirmation and praise" to God. Both meanings are included, including praise to God, self-analysis, repentance and repentance. * * * Volume 13 is divided into two parts. Volume 1-9, the history of 33-year-old mothers from birth to death, the evolution of ideas, and the establishment of beliefs. ; The book 10- 13, Notes on Genesis of the Bible, further analyzes and demonstrates God. Russell: The eleventh volume of Confessions is the best pure philosophical work.

Theory of human nature

How to meet people? Do people know they exist? At that time, both pagans and Christians agreed that man was composed of soul and body. Three views:

1. Manichaeism: the soul and the body are regarded as two independent parts that are evenly matched and parallel to each other, representing light and darkness respectively. The people are the battlefield and the object of their struggle.

2. Some Christians believe that the human body is the home that the soul can't leave, and the human body contains the soul.

3. Platonism: the essence of human beings lies in the soul, and the body lacks its own independent existence, and it is only a tool that the soul temporarily uses and is finally abandoned.

Austria opposes the dualism of parallel soul and body, and thinks that soul plays a leading role in body, but it does not completely deny body like Platonism. His view is a combination of the second and third views. Although human nature is a rational soul, the soul has the nature of dominating the body, and a soul without the body cannot be a human being.

The dominance of soul over body is the same tendency of Greek philosophy, and Austria has made its own explanation: soul and body are two entities with a master-slave relationship, and the combination of them is "an unmixed union". What do you mean? Image theory is a "dual personality theory". Everyone is an "inner person" and an "outer person". Externality: appearance, appearance, body dominated by soul. Internality: the human soul. Relatively speaking, essence is not essence. The master is a human being and a slave, so the relative essence is always something else. Soul and body are the same. The inner person is only a relative essence, and everything else is the body, that is, without the body, there is no human essence. However, because the inner and outer are "inseparable combination", he can study the essence of the soul itself. This essence is connected with "invisible eternal reason", which is the receiver of God's light and the subject of moral practice. Therefore, Augustine's theory of human nature has two tendencies.

What is God? God is truth, truth is God, and God is eternal, which is higher than human thinking, and human thinking cannot understand it. He said, "If you find that there is something eternal that is higher than our reason, can you not call it God?" Austria compares God to the light of truth, the human mind is like eyes, and reason is like eyesight. Just as the eyes can only see under the light, the mind can only know under the light of God. Just as vision without light is only a potential ability, without the guidance of truth rules, reason cannot carry out activities. Therefore, Austria regards lighting as the source of human knowledge and takes it as a prerequisite for cognitive activities.

free will

According to the principle that imperfect things obey perfect things, the order of God, soul and body should be that body obeys soul and soul obeys God. However, because freedom of will is the nature of the soul, the soul can freely choose to obey or violate this order. When the will points to and pursues higher goodness or approaches God, it is goodness; It is evil when it points to and pursues the lower good or keeps away from God. At this time, the soul tends to enjoy the body rather than God. What is the result of the constant movement of free will towards eternal goodness? The result is happiness.

This presents a problem. (1500, 168) Of course, this was its early point of view, so he advocated it later. Talking about the theory of original sin, after original sin, people can't be saved by their own actions or choices, and only by the grace of God can they restore their freedom of will. Because of original sin, the man with free will created by God has died, and man has lost his kind nature and the ability to choose freely. God's gift is embodied in sending his only son to the world, being crucified, and atoning for mankind through this self-sacrifice. This is a very great redemption. These sinners in the world can only be saved by following Christ. Therefore, the most fundamental thing is whether you are a Christian or a pagan.

View of good and evil

God is the best and the truest. Everything is arranged according to the amount of goodness. Because evil is the lack of good, it is a kind of nothingness, which just proves that evil has no substance. See the paragraph in the History of Western Ethical Thought about the view that evil is the lack of the essence of existence.

According to the rank of things and the ethical thoughts contained in this rank sequence, what are the moral principles for a rational person to use his natural ability correctly? Love. Augustine said: As far as I am concerned, the simplest and truest definition of virtue is the order of love. We know that the three virtues of Christianity are faith, hope and love. In the Bible: faith, hope and love, and the greatest of these three is love. Austria's explanation of evil consolidates Christian belief, inspires Christian expectation with grace theory, and regards love as the first virtue. It can be said that Augustine's ethics revolves around faith, hope and love.

So, what's the order? Love the object of spiritual value wholeheartedly and serve this purpose with material value. What do you mean? There are two ways to live: spiritual life and material life. Leo believes that spiritual life is enjoyable; You should live with material things. If you use what you should enjoy, but use spiritual life to obtain material benefits, this is blasphemy to the spirit; If you enjoy what you should use, it is fetishism, which comforts your soul with material enjoyment, so these two orders must not be confused, which violates moral principles. Looking back at the original sentence, we can see that love refers to the individual's pursuit of sacred value goals.

The relationship between reason and belief

We must first acknowledge the existence and omnipotence of God and his creation of the world, and then we can talk about problems in this context, that is, we must put faith first. Christian philosophy is a complete and top-down system. If you don't believe in the supreme God, it is meaningless and incomprehensible to talk about Christianity without faith.

Leo believes that although philosophers of different schools have analyzed the truth of everything in time with reason, they have never considered who gave them this ability, but they are immersed in pride and full of disrespect and contempt for God.

But reason and belief are not opposite poles, but cross each other. Augustine said. Belief belongs to the category of thought, so Austria has given a famous definition of belief. So, how to define the relationship between faith and reason?

First: what you can only believe, what you can't or don't need to understand: historical facts.

Second, believe and understand the objects that work at the same time: mathematical axioms and logical rules. Not only believe but also understand.

Third: the object of believing first and then realizing; The truth about God.

For the knowledge of God, the heart understands because of belief, which is also the belief that the three masters in Delhi said, that is, believing in everything in God, which is a condition for the future. Rationality is to prepare for faith, language, thinking, etc. On the other hand, faith opens the way for rationality. It opens up a field that reason itself can't enter and helps reason understand what it can't understand.

To sum up, these expositions of Augustine had a great influence on medieval thought. His Christian theory, based on rational concern, combined theology and philosophy, and constituted the basic mode of medieval ideology.