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Chapter 27 - Augustine. Man in history and society

from Part V - MARIUS VICTORINUS AND AUGUSTINE

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  28 March 2008

Edited by
A. H. Armstrong
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Summary

We must begin an account of Augustine's views on human history with a distinction between ‘sacred history’ (Heilsgeschichte) and secular history. He does not often use such phrases, but the distinction is implicit in all his utterances. Sacred history is the history of God's revelatory action among men, contained in the books of the Old and New Testaments. It concerns the redemption of the human race wrought in the work of Jesus Christ, and the preparation for this in the history of the chosen race, Israel. In these actions God has revealed his purpose in history; and the Scriptures are their record, the authoritative and certain source for Christian belief. The Scriptures, however, are not a mere formless historical record; the narrative they contain is shaped by the interpretative action of their authors, and would, indeed, be meaningless without this. Being inspired by the Holy Spirit, the significance with which the authors endow the events recorded is itself of divine origin. The scriptural history is therefore sacred in the double sense of containing a narrative of divine action and of telling the narrative in terms of divine providence, endowing its events with a significance within God's plan. Apart from the sacred history contained in the Scriptures, men have no revelation of God's plan, no indication of the significance of historical events in terms of God's purposes. Christians are in the same position as secular historians, except in regard to scriptural history.

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The Cambridge History of Later Greek and Early Medieval Philosophy , pp. 406 - 420
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 1967

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References

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