Augustine’s On Christian Teaching, Scripture and the Classical Education

Abstract
Augustine had a high view of scripture, seeing it as the foundation of life for the individual
and for society, and as the origin of morality, philosophy, eloquence, rhetoric and teaching.
As such, Augustine urged his followers to undertake study of the scripture for understanding.

“There are two things on which all interpretation of scripture depends: the process of
discovering what we need to learn, and the process of presenting what we have learnt” –
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, preface.

On Christian Teaching is a four volume work exploring the substance of Christian belief, the
methods of understanding Scripture, and then finally an examination of the methods of
proclaiming such beliefs.

Augustine was influenced by notions of education and proclamation of his time – there are
many philosophical factors underpinning his doctrine, educational philosophy and rhetorical
approach. While studies of On Christian Doctrine in the light of Augustine’s battles with
heretics, his Platonic background, or his time in the Manichean sect would doubtless prove
beneficial, this work will examine the role the classical Liberal Arts education, and Cicero’s
rhetorical approach shaped the work.

This exploration demonstrates that there is much the modern church, and modern teacher of
the scriptures, can learn from this fourth century churchman.

“He who reads to an audience pronounces aloud the words he sees before him: he who
teaches reading, does it that others may be able to read for themselves. Just so, the man who
explains to an audience the passages of Scripture he understands is like one who reads aloud
the words before him. On the other hand, the man who lays down rules for interpretation is
like one who teaches reading, that is, shows others how to read for themselves.”

“For what a person learns independently of scripture is condemned there if it is harmful, but
found there if it is useful. And when one has found there all the useful knowledge that can be
learnt anywhere else, one will also find there, in much greater abundance, things which are
learnt nowhere else at all, but solely in the remarkable humility of the scriptures.” –
Augustine, On Christian Teaching
Introduction
Augustine of Hippo was a master of destroying arguments and lofty opinions against God,
and taking them captive to Christ (2 Corinthians 10:5), this philosophy underpinned much of
his work. In On Christian Teaching he cites a variety of thinkers, Christian and secular,
demonstrating a conversance with their work,1 and encourages a model of interaction with
such work predicated on plundering intellectual gold wherever it can be found, and realigning
it with the work of the gospel.

Augustine was passionate about the Bible, seeing life under God as the chief end of man, and
mankind as God’s means of achieving this purpose. All things on earth were useful only
insofar as they furthered this end, and thus Christians were called to be conversant with the
people around them, and to be in a position to discern the gold to be plundered from secular
ideas and philosophies.

Augustine, like Origen before him,2 urged believers to study the liberal arts in order to unlock
the mysteries of scripture. In this manner Augustine followed not just Origen, but Cicero, one
of the fathers of the rhetoric, who was a profound intellectual, and spiritual, influence on
Augustine.3 His methodology for the reading and teaching of scripture borrowed heavily from
Cicero’s educational framework, and laid the groundwork for Christian and secular education
in the sciences, arts and humanities for future generations. 4

Augustine flipped Cicero’s paradigm – where his hero desired eloquence above wisdom, the
churchman pursued wisdom and saw eloquence as a tool in the educator’s armoury, rather
than the end goal of education.5

Many passages within Augustine’s work are products of his time and personal experience,
including his unique exegetical and allegorical approach to certain passages of scripture, his
own statement about dealing with the works of others, holds true for interactions with his
work:
1
At a quick glance his work interacts with Cicero, Varro, Plato, Aristotle, Virgil, Pythagoras, Cyprian the martyr,
Lactantius, Victorinus of Optatus, Hilary, Eusebius, Jerome, and his friend Ambrose.
2
Origen, Letter to Gregory, New Advent Church Fathers, http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0415.htm, “But I am
anxious that you should devote all the strength of your natural good parts to Christianity for your end; and in
order to this, I wish to ask you to extract from the philosophy of the Greeks what may serve as a course of study or
a preparation for Christianity, and from geometry and astronomy what will serve to explain the sacred Scriptures,
in order that all that the sons of the philosophers are wont to say about geometry and music, grammar, rhetoric,
and astronomy, as fellow-helpers to philosophy, we may say about philosophy itself, in relation to Christianity.”
3
Augustine, Confessions, Book III, Chapter Four, New Advent Church Fathers,
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/110103.htm, Augustine attributes his eagerness to be an eminent rhetor, and his
turning to the God of the Bible to reading Cicero’s Hortensius.
4
D.L Jeffery, ‘The Pearl of Great Wisdom: The Deep and Abiding Biblical Roots of Western Liberal Education,’
Touchstone, October 2007, 25-30, 27
5
ibid
“A person who is a good and true Christian should realise that truth belongs to his Lord,
wherever it is found, gathering and acknowledging it even in pagan literature, but rejecting
superstitious vanities.”6

While his work contains certain “superstitious vanities” that should be rejected, there is much
truth to be explored and adopted.

This essay will explore Augustine’s framework for reading and teaching the scriptures,
making observations about how his approach to reading the scripture is influenced by his
classical education, and his approach to teaching by his training as an orator. While there is
much to be gleaned by interpreting Augustine through his pre-Christian philosophical and
theological convictions (namely his Platonism and Manicheaism), these observations are
ancillary to this essay, and will only be mentioned as they relate to the topic.

We will examine, in a broad treatment, his approach to the study and teaching of scripture,
concluding that while some elements are chronosyncratic much of this treatise stands the test
of time and provides succor for those seeking to live lives according to scripture, and to teach
it to others.

How to Read The Bible

Augustine believed that scripture should be read for understanding, and that such
understanding would always encourage believers towards acts of charity and away from acts
of crime and vice.7 His hermeneutical key used Jesus’ statement that all the Law and the
Prophets hung on the commandment to love God, and your neighbour as yourself, (Matthew
22:38-40), this was his key for unlocking the whole Scriptures, any interpretation that failed
to meet his criteria was incorrect and should be discarded.8 If a passage was unable to produce
such a meaning then it was to be interpreted as figurative in a way that did. 9

He suggested readers start by familiarising themselves with the text, reading for knowledge
and memory, then move to examining the plain doctrinal truths, before moving to interpret
the less clear passages.10

6
Augustine, On Christian Doctrine, Book Two, 27
7
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book III, Chapter 10
8
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Whoever, then, thinks that he understands the Holy Scriptures, or any part of
them, but puts such an interpretation upon them as does not tend to build up this twofold love of God and our
neighbor, does not yet understand them as he ought.
9
Augstine, On Christian Teaching, Chapter 10
10
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapter 9, Book III, Chapters 26-28
How to Read the Bible - A Hermeneutic of Love
For Augustine, Love truly conquered all, at least all alternative readings of scripture, his
philosophical commitments and intellectual background meshed with his underlying Biblical
hermeneutic and exegetical model to produce an approach to more difficult passages of
scripture that is akin to a contortionist performing acrobatics.

Augustine’s interpretive principles are essentially sound, coupled with an exegetical

commitment to let clear passages of scripture guide interpretation of more difficult passages,
and a desire not to interpret figurative passages as literal. But his views on what passages
were to be taken figuratively, and what to take literally, were broader than necessary.

Augustine’s approach to the issue of loving your neighbour, by first loving yourself, adopts a
Platonic view of identity, and an Aristotelian approach to the question of self-love. 11 He
suggests that in order to love others one must first love oneself, and that man needs no
command to do so.12

Augustine’s hermeneutic of love allowed interpretive flexibility, or license, for those seeking
to understand the Scriptures. Wrong interpretations with loving conclusions were fair game,
and errors of this nature, were simply a detour, 13 though worthy of correction, in case the
incorrect thinker might “get into a habit of going astray,” 14 such errors were not pernicious or
deceptive.15

How to Read the Bible – An Exegetical Model

Augustine struggled to intellectually reconcile the God of the Old Testament with his
convictions about the nature of God,16 and part of his conversion involved a commitment to

11
Aristotle, Nicomachean Ethics, Book IX, Chapter 8, from Sacred Texts, http://www.sacred-
texts.com/cla/ari/nico/nico103.htm, “Therefore the good man should be a lover of self (for he will both himself
profit by doing noble acts, and will benefit his fellows), but the wicked man should not; for he will hurt both
himself and his neighbours,” Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book I, Chapter 5, “Man, therefore, ought to be
taught the due measure of loving, that is, in what measure he may love himself so as to be of service to himself.”
12
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book I, Chapter 5
13
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book I, Chapter 36, “Whoever takes another meaning out of Scripture than
the writer intended, goes astray, but not through any falsehood in Scripture. Nevertheless, as I was going to say, if
his mistaken interpretation tends to build up love, which is the end of the commandment, he goes astray in much
the same way as a man who by mistake quits the high road, but yet reaches through the fields the same place to
which the road leads. He is to be corrected, however, and to be shown how much better it is not to quit the straight
road, lest, if he get into a habit of going astray, he may sometimes take cross roads, or even go in the wrong
direction altogether.”
14
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book I, Chapter 36
15
ibid, “If, on the other hand, a man draws a meaning from them that may be used for the building up of love,
even though he does not happen upon the precise meaning which the author whom he reads intended to express in
that place, his error is not pernicious, and he is wholly clear from the charge of deception.”
16
Augustine, Confessions, 5.14.24, Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book III, Chapters 11-12
interpret those passages within his hermeneutic of love, and an allegorical approach that made
much of his exegesis, particularly of the Old Testament, unreliable. 17 He advocated the
perspicuity of Scripture, suggesting that even the most difficult passages could be understood
using a simple array of tools. He relied on clear doctrine from unambiguous passages when it
came to interpreting ambiguous doctrine in less clear passages. 18

There were certain strengths to the exegetical model laid out in On Christian Teaching. After
explaining the difference between “signs” and “things,” 19 Augustine turns to genre
recognition as vital to understanding the scriptures, with all passages either to be understood
as literal or figurative,20 some signs were included in order to evoke figurative
interpretations,21 but passages were to be considered literal unless they could not be brought
into line with his hermeneutic.22 If this was the case the passage was to be treated as
figurative, and thus became fertile ground for allegory.

How to Read the Bible – An Exegetical Toolkit

To better enable one to understand the more difficult passages in scripture he encouraged the
study of Greek and Hebrew,23 familiarity with conventions of language,24 punctuation and
grammar,25 but only so far as they enabled the better understanding of scripture, and of other
people.

Augustine calls for readers and teachers to elucidate potential hidden meanings in scripture by
understanding those terms and phrases (or signs) the writers of the Bible employ. 26 He
bemoans the clunky translation of idioms into Latin,27 and advocates developing a familiarity
with common idioms by repetition, or seeking out a speaker of that tongue. 28 Other signs, and
biblical analogies can be understood through the study of plants, minerals, sport, the

17
Augustine, Confessions, 5.14.25, describes his movement from the Manicheans “overly literal” interpretation of
the Old Testament to Amrbose’s allegorical approach, and character, and approach he continues to advocate in On
Christian Teaching, e.g Book III, Chapters 11-12
18
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapter 9,
19
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapters 1-4
20
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapters 6, 16, Book III, Chapter 10
21
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapter 10
22
ibid
23
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapters 11, 13
24
Particularly the original languages in order to not attempt clunky translations of idioms, Augustine, On
Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapter 13, 14
25
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book III, Chapters 2-3
26
T. Williams, ‘Biblical Interpretation,’ The Cambridge Companion to Augustine, (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2001), 68-70 contains an overview of Augustine’s approach to becoming an intelligent reader of
Scriptures.
27
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapter 13, 14
28
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapter 14 – this notion of repeating idioms in order to own them is
similar to Cicero’s practice of translating and rewriting great works of Greek oratory in order to become familiar
with their turn of phrase, Cicero, De Oratore, I. xxxiv. 155
mechanical arts, and geography.29 Augustine essentially advocates a Roman “Liberal Arts”
education,30 the kind he himself had received,31 and the kind he represents as a desirable trait
in the possibly auto-biographically fictive person of Trygetius in the Cassiciacum
Dialogues.32 While some argue that Augustine grew disillusioned on the value of such an
education as he grew older,33 Topping (2010) suggests Augustine maintained a middle of the
road, “guardedly optimistic,” view of such an education throughout his life. 34

Knowledge gleaned in study in any of these areas is pursued only to enhance the
understanding of God’s word. On the question of music, which some suspected were
daughters of Jupiter and Mercury, Augustine highlights the interpretive benefits of familiarity
with music, interacting with the work of Varro:

“Many passages are also made inaccessible and opaque by an ignorance of music. It has
been elegantly demonstrated that there are some figurative meanings of things based on the
difference between the psaltry and the lyre…

“But whether Varro’s story is true or not, we should not avoid music because of the
associated pagan superstitions if there is a possibility of gleaning of it something of value for
understanding Holy Scripture.”35

On the question of original languages, Augustine may not have entirely practiced what he
preached, while deeply and vehemently committed to the Bible he engaged in a long running
debate with Jerome on efforts to translate the Hebrew Old Testament, 36 rather than the
29
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapter 31
30
Augustine, Retractions, I.6 Augustine suggests the disciplines of use for Christian interpretation included
grammar, dialectic, rhetoric, arithmetic, music, geometry, and philosophy
31
J.J O’Donnell, ‘De Doctrina Christiana,’ Augustine Through The Ages: An Encyclopedia, ed. A. Fitzgerald &
J.C Cavadini, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999), 280, Augustine, ‘Letter 104: Augustine to Nectarius,’ in
Augustine: Political Writings, Cambridge Texts in the History of Political Thought, ed. E.M Atkins, & R.J Dodaro,
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 12-13, In this letter to Nectarius, Augustine claims to have read the
classical literature of Nectarius (identified as Plato’s Republic in an earlier missive), from his earliest youth,
bemoaning that he was a late starter to applying his mind to Christian literature. His conversance with Roman
literature allows him to make the case for Christianity to Nectarius, a non-Christian.
32
J. McWilliam, ‘Cassiciacum Dialogues’ Augustine Through The Ages: An Encyclopedia, ed. A. Fitzgerald & J.C
Cavadini, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999), 140-142
33
S. MacCormack, ‘Classical Influences on Augustine,’ Augustine Through The Ages: An Encyclopedia, ed. A.
Fitzgerald & J.C Cavadini, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1999), 207, cites Augustine’s Retractions 1.3.2, “many holy
persons are deeply ignorant of these disciplines, and many who know them are not holy.”
34
Some scholars have suggested that Augustine was initially a defender of such an education but was later
“defensive,” perceiving education as a threat to Christian belief. Topping advocates a third view – that Augustine
was always cautiously optimistic regarding such an education, R.N.S Topping, ‘Augustine on Liberal Education:
Defender and Defensive,’ The Heythrop Journal, LI (2010), pp. 377–387
35
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapters 17-18
36
Augustine, ‘Letter to Jerome,’ Letters of St Augustine, Letter 28, 394 AD,
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1102028.htm, “For my own part, I cannot sufficiently express my wonder that
anything should at this date be found in the Hebrew manuscripts which escaped so many translators perfectly
acquainted with the language. I say nothing of the LXX., regarding whose harmony in mind and spirit, surpassing
that which is found in even one man, I dare not in any way pronounce a decided opinion, except that in my
Septuagint, a translation Augustine held in high esteem on account of its divine provenance. 37
After a series of heated missives between the two patriarchs, 38 where in one case Augustine
recounted the plight of a fellow bishop narrowly avoided a riot, and expulsion from his parish,
over a new translation of a single word in Jonah, 39 Augustine eventually welcomed the
translation from Hebrew,40 but was more excited by Jerome’s attempts to translate the Greek
text.41 Augustine argued that the Septuagint had been widely distributed, used by the
apostles,42 and alternate translations would undermine confidence in the word for those aware
of such debates.43 Some scholars have suggested Augustine’s own language skills fell short of
the standard he advocates in On Christian Teaching,44 a passage from Confessions seems to
imply that he found Hebrew unintelligible,45 though he regularly undertakes Hebrew word

judgment, beyond question, very high authority must in this work of translation be conceded to them...” Jerome,
‘Letter to Augustine,’ Letters of St. Augustine, Letter 75, 404 AD, http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1102075.htm,
“…in my attempt to translate into Latin, for the benefit of those who speak the same language with myself, the
corrected Greek version of the Scriptures, I have laboured not to supersede what has been long esteemed, but only
to bring prominently forward those things which have been either omitted or tampered with by the Jews, in order
that Latin readers might know what is found in the original Hebrew.”
37
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapter 15, Augustine, City of God, XVIII chap 43, Augustine,
Letter to Jerome, Letters of St Augustine, Letter 71, Chapter 2, 403 AD,
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1102071.htm,
38
Augustine, Letter to Jerome, Letters of St Augustine, Letter 71, Chapter 2 “For my part, I would much rather
that you would furnish us with a translation of the Greek version of the canonical Scriptures known as the work of
the Seventy translators.”
39
Augustine, Letter to Jerome, Letters of St Augustine, Letter 71, Chapter 3, tells a story of a bishop who
introduced Jerome’s new version of Jonah to the church where they discovered an unfamiliar word, a translation
that almost sparked a riot, “thereupon arose such a tumult in the congregation, especially among the Greeks,
correcting what had been read, and denouncing the translation as false, that the bishop was compelled to ask the
testimony of the Jewish residents… suggesting this bishop had to correct Jerome “…as he desired not to be left
without a congregation—a calamity which he narrowly escaped,” Augustine highlighted the dangers of working
with unpopular languages. Jerome responds, Jerome to Augustus, Letter 75. Chapter 7, Jerome enquires what this
tumultuous word might have been, observing that Augustine failed to tell him “thus taking away the possibility of
my saying anything in my own vindication, lest my reply should be fatal to your objection,” further speculating that
the issue revolves around the translation of a plant genus (gourd or ivy).
40
Augustine, Letter to Jerome, Letters of St Augustine, Letter 82, Chapter 5.34, 405 AD,
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1102082.htm
41
Augustine, Letter to Jerome, Letters of St Augustine, Letter 82, Chapter 5.35
42
Augustine, Letter to Jerome, Letters of St Augustine, Letter 71, Chapter 4
43
Augustine, Letter to Jerome, Letters of St Augustine, Letter 71, Chapter 2, “For if your translation begins to be
more generally read in many churches, it will be a grievous thing that, in the reading of Scripture, differences
must arise between the Latin Churches and the Greek Churches, especially seeing that the discrepancy is easily
condemned in a Latin version by the production of the original in Greek, which is a language very widely known;
whereas, if any one has been disturbed by the occurrence of something to which he was not accustomed in the
translation taken from the Hebrew, and alleges that the new translation is wrong, it will be found difficult, if not
impossible, to get at the Hebrew documents by which the version to which exception is taken may be defended.”
44
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapter 11, Many have suggested Augustine had “no Hebrew, and
little Greek,” for example T. Williams, ‘Biblical Interpretation,’ The Cambridge Companion to Augustine,
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 70, at footnote 8.
45
Augustine, Confessions, Book XI, Chapter Three, New Advent Church Fathers Collection,
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/110111.htm, Augustine asks to speak to Moses regarding the creation of the
world and says “And should he speak in the Hebrew tongue, in vain would it beat on my senses, nor would
anything touch my mind; but if in Latin, I should know what he said. But whence should I know whether he said
what was true?”- This seems possible to interpret as a rhetorical emphasis on Moses’ origins in a foreign time and
place, and the witness Augustine expected he could still have to his soul (because the Spirit would confirm what
was true: “But whence should I know whether he said what was true? But if I knew this even, should I know it from
him? Verily within me, within in the chamber of my thought, Truth, neither Hebrew, nor Greek, nor Latin, nor
barbarian, without the organs of voice and tongue, without the sound of syllables, would say, "He speaks the
truth," and I, immediately assured of it, confidently would say unto that man of Yours, "You speak the truth."
studies in his exegesis.46 Augustine’s grasp of Hebrew in these studies is rudimentary at best,
and his Greek became more fluent with age. He may not have been as capable in either as
Jerome, but he was certainly able to wield them in order to develop the sort of interpretive
conclusions that would make Nicholas Cage’s character in National Treasure proud. That is
to say the basis for such conclusions was often shaky, 47 and the conclusions themselves
subject to a vivid imagination, and an exegetical commitment to fanciful allegory. 48

How to Read the Bible – Plundering the gold of others

Prior to his conversion, Augustine was deeply committed to Neo-Platonism, and an adherent
of Manicheaism, a Persian Gnostic religion.49 His experience with, and conversion from, these
beliefs profoundly shaped his Christianity, his worldview, and his approach to understanding
the Bible. But it is perhaps his admiration of Cicero, his classical education, and his
background as an orator, that most profoundly shaped his ministry and philosophy.

His conversion to Christianity was fundamentally rational, and the result of a long process of
thought, and powerful rhetoric. He describes the process in Confessions,50 but the value he
placed on his study of alternate philosophies is found in his approach to secular knowledge in
On Christian Teaching.

His engaging with secular thoughts followed an established practice, traced through the works
of the apostles, early church fathers like Clement, Origen, and his contemporary, Jerome.51
While others were content to interact with the ideas of foreign teaching, Augustine follows

46
Augustine, Exposition on Psalm 133, from New Advent Church Fathers Collection,
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1801133.htm contains a study of the word “hermon,” a light set on a high place,
his word study says: “The word is Hebrew, and we learn its meaning from them who know that language,” it leads
to an allegorical link to Christ, his Exposition on Psalm 132 from New Advent Church Fathers Collection,
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1801132.htm, contains a similar study of the word Ephrata, with reference to
the Latin equivalent, Speculum, from the “translators of Hebrew words in the Scriptures” who have “handed down
to us that we might understand them” – this word study also leads to an allegorical interpretation of the Psalm.
47
Augustine was, by his own admission in his cited works on Psalms, relying on the testimony of others when it
came to his use of Hebrew rather than seeking out Hebrew instruction from the Jewish community.
48
A commitment grounded in his conversion under Ambrose as recorded in Confessions – “This was especially
clear after I had heard one or two parts of the Old Testament explained allegorically--whereas before this, when I
had interpreted them literally, they had "killed" me spiritually.” Augustine, Confessions, 5.14.24
49
Augustine, Confessions, 5.14.25
50
Augustine, Confessions, 5.14.25, from New Advent Church Fathers Collection,
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/110105.htm - Still, concerning the body of this world, nature as a whole - now
that I was able to consider and compare such things more and more - I now decided that the majority of the
philosophers held the more probable views. So, in what I thought was the method of the Academics - doubting
everything and fluctuating between all the options - I came to the conclusion that the Manicheans were to be
abandoned. For I judged, even in that period of doubt, that I could not remain in a sect to which I preferred some
of the philosophers. But I refused to commit the cure of my fainting soul to the philosophers, because they were
without the saving name of Christ. I resolved, therefore, to become a catechumen in the Catholic Church - which
my parents had so much urged upon me - until something certain shone forth by which I might guide my course.”
51
D.L Jeffery, ‘The Pearl of Great Wisdom: The Deep and Abiding Biblical Roots of Western Liberal Education,’
Touchstone, October 2007, 25-30, 27
Origen, whose Letter to Gregory urges his Christian reader to read widely, looking for truth
wherever possible, with a view to incorporating it into sound Christian belief.52

…in order that, by spoiling the Egyptians, they might have material for the preparation of the
things which pertained to the service of God. – Origen, Letter to Gregory

“These treasures… must be removed by Christians as they separate themselves in spirit from
the wretched company of pagans, and applied to their true function, that of preaching the
gospel.” – Augustine, On Christian Teaching

Jerome urges a similar approach as he observes the Biblical writers engaging with
contemporary poets and philosophers, though he closes with a slightly less elegant analogy,
David beheading Goliath with his own sword, to describe the Apostle Paul’s approach.53

Augustine recognised truth in many systems of thought, expecting a harmonious relationship

between special and general revelation, 54 he suggested all pagan learning either concerned
human institutions (philosophy) or described divinely instituted order (natural law), 55 and that
truth therein belonged to God and should be used for his purposes. He has a particular soft
spot for Platonism, suggesting a large correlation with Christianity. 56 He attempts to explain
this overlap, speculating that during the philosopher’s pilgrimage to Egypt, he must have
discovered Jewish monotheism, speculation he later adapted in City of God.57 Regardless of
the source of Plato’s divine inspiration, Augustine was happy to adopt a redemptive approach
to secular thought, bringing such truth as could be found elsewhere under the banner of
Christianity in order to better understand and teach the gospel.

Knowledge, Wisdom and Eloquence: The Nexus of “faith seeking understanding,” and
teaching, and Augustine’s contribution to education
52
Origen, Letter to Gregory, New Advent Church Fathers, http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0415.htm
53
D.L Jeffery, ‘The Pearl of Great Wisdom: The Deep and Abiding Biblical Roots of Western Liberal Education,’
Touchstone, October 2007, 25-30, 26, Jerome, Letter to Magnus, an Orator of Rome, Letters of St Jerome, Letter
70, New Advent Church Fathers, http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001070.htm
54
D.L Jeffery, ‘The Pearl of Great Wisdom: The Deep and Abiding Biblical Roots of Western Liberal Education,’
Touchstone, October 2007, 25-30, 28
55
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, “There are two kinds of learning pursued even in pagan society. One
consists of things which have been instituted by humans, the other consists of things already developed or divinely
instituted, which have been observed by them.”
56
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, “Any statements by those which are called philosophers, especially the
Platonists, which happen to be true and consistent with our own faith should not cause alarm, but be claimed for
our own use, as it were from owners who have no right to them. Like the treasures of the Ancient Egyptians.”
57
Augustine, City of God, Book VIII, Chapter 11, from New Advents Church Fathers Collection,
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/120108.htm, by the time he wrote City of God Augustine has recalculated the
dates of Plato’s pilgrimage, ruling out a coincidence with the translators of the Septuagint under Ptolmey, but
suggesting Plato’s insatiable curiosity must have brought him in contact with Jewish ideas citing immutability as a
key doctrinal point of Judaism that Plato must only have found there.
Wisdom and eloquence, or eloquence and wisdom? This was a defining question for classical
philosophers and orators.58

Plato, in Phaedrus, had suggested rhetoric should merge with philosophy and serve as
background for a dialectic approach to wisdom, 59 he distrusted written communication and
preferred oratory as a means for developing wisdom, 60 Plato also advocated understanding the
“soul” of your audience in order to speak their language of persuasion, 61 in the right language
for the occasion,62 a concept Augustine promotes for those looking to teach the church, 63
though he was much more favourably disposed to the written word. 64

Aristotle believed that dialectic and rhetoric were two sides of the same coin, useful for
instruction65 and that there were three types of persuasion: logos, pathos and ethos, 66 and three
varieties of rhetoric: political, forensic, and ceremonial. 67 The end of man, and thus the end of
rhetoric, was happiness:

“Whatever creates or increases happiness or some part of happiness, we ought to do;

whatever destroys or hampers happiness, or gives rise to its opposite, we ought not to do.” 68

Augustine had no trouble reconciling happiness as man’s chief end, or the supreme good,
with declaring God also our supreme good. 69 They were one and the same.70

58
C.E Quillen, ‘Reading Augustine, Augustine on Reading,’ Rereading the Renaissance: Petrarch, Augustine, and
the Language of Humanism, (Michigan: University of Michigan Press, 1998), 23-24
59
Plato, Phaedrus, 276e, from Perseus, http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext
%3A1999.01.0174%3Atext%3DPhaedrus%3Apage%3D275, Plato suggests dialetic discourse that “plants and
sows” an intelligent word in a fitting soul is “far nobler” than writing one’s thoughts for posterity.
60
Plato, Phaedrus, 275a-e
61
Plato, Phaedrus, 271.d
62
Plato, Phaedrus, 272.a, 277
63
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book IV, Chapters 14, 22-23
64
P.R.L Brown, Augustine of Hippo: A Biography, (Berkeley, California University Press, 1967), 300-306
documents the care Augustine took when composing his Magnum Opus, City of God, R.N.S Topping, ‘Augustine
on Liberal Education,’ notes we have more than five million extant words written by Augustine.
65
Aristotle, Aristotle’s Rhetoric, Book 1, Chapter 1, from http://www2.iastate.edu/~honeyl/Rhetoric/rhet1-1.html
66
Aristotle, Aristotle’s Rhetoric, Book 1, Chapter 2, http://www2.iastate.edu/~honeyl/Rhetoric/rhet1-2.html – or
reason, emotional manipulation, and personal character or credibility.
67
Aristotle, Aristotle’s Rhetoric, Book 1, Chapter 3, http://www2.iastate.edu/~honeyl/Rhetoric/rhet1-3.html
68
Aristotle, Rhetoric, Book 1, Chapter 5
69
J.L O’Donovan, ‘The Political Thought of the City of God,’ Bonds of Imperfection: Christian Politics, Past and
Present, O. O’Donovan and J.L O’Donovan, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003), 49-50, 54, suggests Augustine
shared a classical understanding that a “thing’s” end is its perfection, and for humanity the final good is eternal
life, which is the only true source of happiness, he suggests it is possible to enjoy a qualified happiness now “It is
the hope of the eternal that makes us relatively happy, for only in hope can we enjoy the true good of the mind,
which is to contemplate the eternal.”
70
B. Kent, ‘Augustine’s Ethics,’ The Cambridge Companion to Augustine, (Cambridge: Cambridge University
Press, 2001), 216
Cicero argued that rhetoric and reason, or wisdom and eloquence, were together the basis for
civilised society.71 He believed that oratory depended on knowledge, and conversely
knowledge depended on oratory, 72 for without it nobody would learn, his work De Oratore
bears a certain resemblance to Augustine’s teaching in On Christian Teaching, in its dealings
with virtue and vice,73 and the call for orators to be familiar with a wide range of disciplines.
The notion of wisdom without eloquence was a foreign one. Cicero argued that a “mute and
voiceless wisdom” had no hope of persuading or changing lives. 74 While modern scholarship
has been dismissive of Cicero’s place in the canon of philosophers and orators – he had a
profound impact on Augustine’s life and teaching.75 Foley (1999) suggests many of
Augustine’s written works were a tribute or response to Cicero’s writings. 76 In this manner
Augustine’s On Christian Teaching takes its place amongst the volumes of works that
pioneered a classical “liberal arts” education. 77

While some have suggested describing Augustine as a philosopher in the modern age is a
misnomer as he essentially ceased to be a philosopher when he was converted, 78 and it is true
that his conversion led him to distance himself from certain aspects of his previous
philosophical beliefs.79 Augustine’s model for learning and understanding the scriptures
through broad knowledge of other disciplines borrows heavily on philosophy, and the
classical education championed by Plato’s Republic,80 Varro’s encyclopedic Libri Novem

71
J. May, ‘Cicero's Ideal Orator and the Saint Olaf Graduate: The Tradition Continues?’ Mellby Lecture, Founders
Day, 1996, St. Olaf College, http://www.stolaf.edu/offices/doc/PublicRemarks/MellbyLecture1996.html
72
Cicero, De Oratore, I. ii. 5-8,
http://www.archive.org/stream/cicerodeoratore01ciceuoft/cicerodeoratore01ciceuoft_djvu.txt Cicero held that
oratory depended on the trained skill of highly educated people, rather than natural talent.
73
Cicero, De Oratore, II. I. xxxv, 349
74
Cicero, De Inventione, Book I, Chapter 2, http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/On_invention/Book_1?match=la “And
it certainly seems to me that no wisdom which was silent and destitute of skill in speaking could have had such
power as to turn men on a sudden from their previous customs, and to lead them to the adoption of a different
system of life… how could men possibly have been induced to learn to cultivate integrity and to maintain justice,
and to be accustomed willingly to obey others, and to think it right not only to encounter toil for the sake of the
general advantage, but even to run the risk of losing their lives, if men had not been able to persuade them by
eloquence of the truth of those principles which they had discovered by philosophy?”
75
M.P Foley, ‘Cicero, Augustine, and the Philosophical Roots of the Cassiciacum Dialogues,’ Revue des Études
Augustiniennes, 45 (1999), 51-77, 51-53
76
M.P Foley, op. cit. 62
77
C.E Quillen, ‘Reading Augustine, Augustine on Reading,’ 23-25
78
J. Rist, ‘Faith and Reason,’ The Cambridge Guide to Augustine, ed. E. Stump and N. Kretzmann, (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2001), 27
79
A.W Matthews, The Development of St. Augustine from Neoplatonism to Christianity. 386-391 A.D
(Washington: University Press of America, 1980), 261. Augustine was happy to relinquish elements of his
platonic, and neo-platonic, way of viewing the world in order to conform to Christian thinking and beliefs.
80
Plato, Republic, Book VII, 521c-531c, from Perseus http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus
%3Atext%3A1999.01.0168%3Abook%3D7%3Asection%3D522d, Plato outlines five disciplines – geometry,
astronomy, music, arithmetic, and dialetic, see R.N.S Topping, ‘Augustine on Liberal Education: Defender and
Defensive,’ The Heythrop Journal, LI (2010), 379, regarding the desirability of a liberal arts education.
Disciplinarum,81 and Cicero’s De Oratore,82 the end goal of such an education was oratory,83
this was the final step in a classical education and the ticket to social mobility. 84 Jeffery
(2007) suggests Augustine appropriated Cicero’s educational philosophy “to a biblical order
of reasoning about language and truth.”85

Some scholars suggest Augustine’s view of the Liberal Arts changed from a romantic notion
of a liberal arts Christian curriculum designed to introduce students to God, 86 to a position
based solely on understanding the scriptures,87 with only God as a teacher.88 A more tenable
position is to see Augustine’s position on the arts developing into that expressed in On
Christian Teaching, namely that the liberal arts are of subordinate use in helping one
understand the Bible.89 Topping (2010) identifies five occasions where Augustine lists the
elements of Plato’s educational model.90 For Augustine, such an education is only useful so
far as it aids in the understanding and teaching of Scripture, 91 though he thought those with a
liberal education worth engaging with intellectually, 92 and his writings carried references to
literature and poetry common for somebody educated that way.

81
A.F West, ‘The Seven Liberal Arts,’ Alcuin and the Rise of Christian Schools, (New York: Scribner, 1892,
reprinted by BiblioLife Reproductions, 2009), 6-7, identifies Varro as the Roman father of the Liberal Arts
movement, with Cicero a strong supporter. Varro identified nine arts – grammar, rhetoric, logic, arithmetic,
geometry, astronomy, musical theory, medicine and architecture, the last two were omitted by subsequent writers,
and Cicero helped popularise this style of education in Rome see D.C Lindberg, The Beginnings of Western
Science: The European Scientific Tradition in Philosophical, Religious and Institutional Context, 600 B.C to 1450
AD, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1992), 138-141
82
Cicero, De Oratore, Book 1, XLII promotes music, geometry, astronomy, literature, and oratory as the “contents
of the arts.”
83
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapters 29-40, advocates knowledge of natural science, the
mechanical arts, logic, dialectics, eloquence and rhetoric.
84
C.E Quillen, ‘Reading Augustine, Augustine on Reading,’ 24
85
D.L Jeffery, ‘The Pearl of Great Wisdom: The Deep and Abiding Biblical Roots of Western Liberal Education,’
Touchstone, October 2007, 25-30, 26
86
Augustine, Retractions, I. 5, recounts his beginning of five textbooks on dialectic, rhetoric, geometry, arithmetic
and philosophy, which he later abandoned when he took up his position in Hippo, see C. Kirwan, ‘Augustine’s
Philosophy of Language,’ Cambridge Companion to Augustine, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001),
188
87
P.R.L Brown, Augustine of Hippo: A Biography, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967), 262-269,
R.N.S Topping, ‘Augustine on Liberal Education: Defender and Defensive,’ The Heythrop Journal, LI (2010),
381, 383 identifies three phases of Augustinian thought on a Liberal education – enthusiasm (Cassiciacum),
repudiation (in Confessions), and finally adaptation, which came in the guise of On Christian Teaching. It is this
final stage we are most interested in.
88
C. Kirwan, ‘Augustine’s Philosophy of Language,’ Cambridge Companion to Augustine, (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 2001), 190, Augustine, Retractions, I.II, says “there is no teacher who teaches man
knowledge except God,” Kirwan argues that Augustine is not precluding human transfer of information in this
statement, but rather writing against a Platonic conception of knowledge.
89
There are two scholarly views on the issue – the first, as outlined by Topping (see above), the second suggests
Augustine sought to dissolve the arts education completely. R.N.S Topping, ‘Augustine on Liberal Education:
Defender and Defensive,’ The Heythrop Journal, LI (2010), 383
90
R.N.S Topping, ‘Augustine on Liberal Education: Defender and Defensive,’ The Heythrop Journal, LI (2010),
379 identifies ord. 2.12.35–47, 2.4.13–14; quant. 23.72; retr. 1.6; conf. 4.16.30.
91
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapters 29-42
92
Augustine, ‘Letter 87: Augustine to Emeritus,’ in Augustine: Political Writings, Cambridge Texts in the History
of Political Thought, ed. E.M Atkins, & R.J Dodaro, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), 136
Augustine saw the path to wisdom as a seven-step process – fear, piety, knowledge,
resolution, counsel, purification of heart, and finally wisdom. 93 Such an education was
valuable in stage three, but of only limited value to finding true Christian wisdom. Scripture
was to be read seeking understanding,94 in order that one might no longer need the scriptures
except to instruct others.95 Knowledge of the arts was an important basis for rhetoric, and thus
for instructing others.

How To Teach The Bible: Augustine’s non-Guide to Rhetoric

Augustine described his conversion from orator to bishop as moving from being a “vendor of
words” to being a “preacher of the word.”96 For Augustine, as for Cicero, true eloquence was
not found in the ability to speak, but also in knowing how to speak to one’s audience,
understanding a variety of philosophies and spheres of knowledge, 97 and how they related to
ones teaching.98 Both men believed eloquence was better caught than taught, 99 both advocated
employing three styles (the elevated, moderate, and plain), with Augustine differing from
Cicero in his desire to choose the best style for the majority of the audience, 100 both thought
oratory served to teach, please, and persuade. 101

Augustine’s approach to teaching mirrors his own conversion experience under rhetorical
power of his mentor Ambrose, which he recounts in Confessions.102 This experience, and his
professional background as a master of the art of rhetoric, shaped his approach to Christian
teaching and preaching. Volume four of On Christian Teaching represents Augustine’s
“plunder” of Cicero’s rhetorical method, and includes some guidelines by which the Bible

93
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapter 7
94
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, Chapter 9
95
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book One, “Therefore a person strengthened by faith, hope and love, and
who steadfastly holds on to them, has no need of the scriptures except to instruct others.” –
96
R. Lueke, ‘The Rhetoric of Faith,’ Word and World, Volume VI, Number 3, 1986, 304-312, 309
97
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book II, 29-42, as earlier mentioned advocated “plundering gold from the
Egyptians,” but also the study of various disciplines so long as they added to one’s understanding of scripture,
Cicero, De Oratore, I. xv. 65-66 suggests technical knowledge improves teaching, and xxxiv. 158-159 that
knowledge of philosophy, poetry, the arts, politics and humour give presentations a “seasoning of salt.”
98
Cicero, De Oratore, I. xxi. 95, Cicero looked forward to discovering one whose speaking ability was matched by
wide reading and knowledge, that man could be actually called eloquent, not “merely accomplished.”
99
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book IV, Chapters 6-8, suggested eloquence was best learned reading the
works of eloquent teachers, Cicero advocated translating speeches from eminent orators from Greek to Latin in
order to discover fresh idioms and to make their words his, Cicero, De Oratore, I. xxxiv. 155
100
Curley, A, ‘Marcus Tullius Cicero,’ Augustine Through the Ages: An Encyclopedia, ed. A. Fitzgerald & J.
Cavadini, 191
101
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book IV, Chapters 4, 12 Curley, A, ‘Marcus Tullius Cicero,’ Augustine
Through the Ages: An Encyclopedia, ed. A. Fitzgerald & J. Cavadini, 192
102
Augustine, Confessions, 5.14.24, where he recounts how he sat under Ambrose teaching to marvel at his
oratory ability, and found himself swayed by the power of his content, and eventually persuaded “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. And, while I opened my
heart to acknowledge how skillfully he spoke, there also came an awareness of how truly he spoke--but only
gradually.”
should be presented. While not providing a comprehensive handbook to the rhetoric
Augustine once taught,103 he presents rhetoric as a morally neutral activity of benefit to the
proclamation of the gospel,104 his view of rhetoric was Aristotelian. Wrong use did not negate
right use.105

Augustine developed a Christian position on the relationship between sapientia (wisdom) and
eloquentia (eloquence). Wisdom was to be more desired than eloquence. 106 For Augustine
eloquence followed understanding, as teaching followed reading. Understanding came first, as
it was only once one understood that one could teach (a seemingly obvious, but somewhat
foreign concept to certain advocates of eloquence).

Augustine realigned educational theory with the Bible as the foundation for all learning, and
then plunders the art of rhetoric as the basis for teaching this system. He outlines the three
styles of voice and when to employ them,107 and demonstrates that eloquence is not just a
good tool, but also used by biblical writers,108 he calls for Christian teachers to live lives
consistent with their teaching,109 to pray before they preach,110 and in a move consistent with
his views on Egyptian gold, he also advocates the borrowing of sermons from brilliant
writers.111

Conclusion
Augustine’s framework for becoming a wise reader and teacher of the Bible had an
incredible, long-term, wide-ranging impact. Not just on the teaching of the church, and a
Christian approach of “faith seeking understanding” but in the system of secular education as
well. Augustine’s Christian approach to the liberal arts styled education of the Romans, with
scripture as a foundation for learning, laid the platform for education systems throughout the
western world. While some have bemoaned is subordination of scholarship as a handmaiden
of faith as a setback in the development of education, 112 Jeffery (2007) suggests his

103
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book IV, Chapter 1
104
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book IV, Chapter 2
105
Aristotle, Aristotle’s Rhetoric, Book 1, Chapter 1, “And if it be objected that one who uses such power of
speech unjustly might do great harm, that is a charge which may be made in common against all good things
except virtue, and above all against the things that are most useful, as strength, health, wealth, generalship. A man
can confer the greatest of benefits by a right use of these, and inflict the greatest of injuries by using them
wrongly.”
106
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book IV, Chapter 5
107
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book Four, Chapters 9-26
108
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book Four, Chapter 7
109
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book Four, Chapter 27
110
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book Four, Chapters 15, 30
111
Augustine, On Christian Teaching, Book Four, 29
112
D.C Lindberg,The Beginnings of Western Science, 150-151
pedagogical stratagems for reading Scripture became the “procedural and methodological
basis of nearly all scholarship in the humanities.” 113

His interpretive model, which suffers somewhat as a product of its time, lays the groundwork
for solid exegesis and provides a useful hermeneutical framework when reading Scripture for
meaning. If it is not promoting love of God, and love of one’s neighbour, or is not steering
one away from acts of crime and vice towards acts of love, then it’s not right.

His model for preaching and teaching, based on engaging and persuading as many people as
possible with the truth of the gospel is an ancient handbook for modern missiology, and many
of today’s preachers and teachers would benefit from the exercise of considering Augustine’s
approach to understanding the Bible, and passing that understanding on to your neighbours
with the tools available.

113
D.L Jeffery, ‘The Pearl of Great Wisdom: The Deep and Abiding Biblical Roots of Western Liberal Education,’
Touchstone, October 2007, 25-30, 27
Bibliography

Ancient Texts

Augustine
Confessions
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1101.htm

On Christian Teaching
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1202.htm

Letter to Jerome, Letters of St Augustine, Letter 71, Chapter 2, 403 AD,

http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1102071.htm

Augustine, Letter to Jerome, Letters of St Augustine, Letter 82, Chapter 5.35, 405 AD,
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1102082.htm

Letter 87: Augustine to Emeritus, in Augustine: Political Writings, Cambridge Texts in the History of Political
Thought, ed. E.M Atkins, & R.J Dodaro, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press)

Exposition on Psalm 133, from New Advent Church Fathers Collection,

http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1801133.htm

Exposition on Psalm 132 from New Advent Church Fathers Collection,

http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1801132.htm

City of God, New Advents Church Fathers Collection, http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/120108.htm

Jerome

Letter to Augustine,’ Letters of St. Augustine, Letter 75, 404 AD,

http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/1102075.htm
Letter to Magnus, an Orator of Rome, Letters of St Jerome, Letter 70, New Advent Church Fathers,
http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/3001070.htm

Origen
Letter to Gregory, New Advent Church Fathers, http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/0415.htm

Cicero
De Oratore from
http://www.archive.org/stream/cicerodeoratore01ciceuoft/cicerodeoratore01ciceuoft_djvu.txt

De Inventione, from http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/On_invention/Book_1?match=la

Plato
Phaedrus, from Perseus, http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext
%3A1999.01.0174%3Atext%3DPhaedrus%3Apage%3D275

Republic, from Perseus

http://www.perseus.tufts.edu/hopper/text?doc=Perseus%3Atext%3A1999.01.0168%3Abook
%3D7%3Asection%3D522d

Aristotle
Aristotle’s Rhetoric, http://www2.iastate.edu/~honeyl/Rhetoric/index.html

Modern Authors
P.R.L Brown, Augustine of Hippo: A Biography, (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967)
H. Chadwick, Augustine, A Very Short Introduction, (Oxford, Oxford University Press, 2001)

M.P Foley, ‘Cicero, Augustine, and the Philosophical Roots of the Cassiciacum Dialogues,’ Revue des
Études Augustiniennes, 45 (1999), 51-77

D.L Jeffery, ‘The Pearl of Great Wisdom: The Deep and Abiding Biblical Roots of Western Liberal
Education,’ Touchstone, October 2007, 25-30

D.C Lindberg, The Beginnings of Western Science: The European Scientific Tradition in
Philosophical, Religious and Institutional Context, 600 B.C to 1450 AD, (Chicago: University of
Chicago Press, 1992)

R. Lueke, ‘The Rhetoric of Faith,’ Word and World, Volume VI, Number 3, 1986,
304-312
A.W Matthews, The Development of St. Augustine from Neoplatonism to Christianity. 386-391 A.D
(Washington: University Press of America, 1980)

J. May, ‘Cicero's Ideal Orator and the Saint Olaf Graduate: The Tradition Continues?’ Mellby Lecture,
Founders Day, 1996, St. Olaf College,
http://www.stolaf.edu/offices/doc/PublicRemarks/MellbyLecture1996.html

J. O’Donovan, ‘The Political Thought of the City of God,’ Bonds of Imperfection: Christian Politics,
Past and Present, O. O’Donovan and J.L O’Donovan, (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2003)

C.E Quillen, ‘Reading Augustine, Augustine on Reading,’ Rereading the Renaissance: Petrarch,
Augustine, and the Language of Humanism, (Michigan: University of Michigan Press, 1998)

R.N.S Topping, ‘Augustine on Liberal Education: Defender and Defensive,’ The Heythrop Journal, LI
(2010), pp. 377–387

A.F West, ‘The Seven Liberal Arts,’ Alcuin and the Rise of Christian Schools, (New York: Scribner,
1892, reprinted by BiblioLife Reproductions, 2009)

The Cambridge Guide to Augustine, ed. E. Stump and N. Kretzmann, (Cambridge: Cambridge
University Press, 2001)