St. Augustine's Origin Of Evil In The World
Kaila Rogers
Theology 101.06
10/14/2015
The bible describes the story of creation, but does not share how evil entered the world. In book II of Confessions, Saint Augustine tries to answer this question. Through Augustine’s life journey, he analyzes his own sins and comes to understand the origin of evil. In the second book of Confessions, Saint Augustine recounts sins from his past to try to explain where sin comes from. He tells the story of a theft he and his friends committed when they were young:
Close to our vineyard there was a pear tree laden with fruit. This fruit was not enticing, either in appearance or in flavor. We nasty lads went there to shake down the fruit and carry it off at dead of night, after prolonging our games out of doors until that late hour according to our abominable custom. We took enormous quantities, not to feast on ourselves but perhaps to throw to the pigs; we did eat a few, but that was not our motive: we derived pleasure from the deed simply because it was forbidden. (bk II, 9)
Augustine did …show more content…
He claims that “sin gains entrance through good things when we turn to them with immoderate desire, since they are the lowest kind of goods and we thereby turn away from the better and higher: from you yourself, O Lord our God, and your truth and your law” (bk II, 10). Augustine says that sin happens when we love the good things that God has created, in the wrong ways or desire the lesser good things more. For example, the pears themselves were good, but the way that Augustine desired them was not: “ Those pears were beautiful, but they were not what my miserable soul loved. I had plenty of better ones, and I plucked them only for the sake of stealing, for once picked I threw them away. I feasted on the sin, nothing else, and that I relished and enjoyed” (bk II, 18). In other words, Augustine claims that sin comes from perversion of the
Theology 101.06
10/14/2015
The bible describes the story of creation, but does not share how evil entered the world. In book II of Confessions, Saint Augustine tries to answer this question. Through Augustine’s life journey, he analyzes his own sins and comes to understand the origin of evil. In the second book of Confessions, Saint Augustine recounts sins from his past to try to explain where sin comes from. He tells the story of a theft he and his friends committed when they were young:
Close to our vineyard there was a pear tree laden with fruit. This fruit was not enticing, either in appearance or in flavor. We nasty lads went there to shake down the fruit and carry it off at dead of night, after prolonging our games out of doors until that late hour according to our abominable custom. We took enormous quantities, not to feast on ourselves but perhaps to throw to the pigs; we did eat a few, but that was not our motive: we derived pleasure from the deed simply because it was forbidden. (bk II, 9)
Augustine did …show more content…
He claims that “sin gains entrance through good things when we turn to them with immoderate desire, since they are the lowest kind of goods and we thereby turn away from the better and higher: from you yourself, O Lord our God, and your truth and your law” (bk II, 10). Augustine says that sin happens when we love the good things that God has created, in the wrong ways or desire the lesser good things more. For example, the pears themselves were good, but the way that Augustine desired them was not: “ Those pears were beautiful, but they were not what my miserable soul loved. I had plenty of better ones, and I plucked them only for the sake of stealing, for once picked I threw them away. I feasted on the sin, nothing else, and that I relished and enjoyed” (bk II, 18). In other words, Augustine claims that sin comes from perversion of the