Enchiridion (Handbook on Faith, Hope, and Love)

Contents

Reading pages: 1–19 · 20–39 · 40–64 · 65–87 · 88–109 · 110–122

1. 1Augustine greets Laurentius and wishes him the true wisdom that comes from God.
2. 2Man's wisdom is godliness, the worship of God, as Job 28:28 says in the Greek.
3. 3God is worshipped by faith, hope, and love, and explaining what each concerns will answer all Laurentius's questions.
4. 4Laurentius asked for a handbook on what to follow and avoid, the relation of reason and faith, the beginning and end, the sum of doctrine, and the foundation of the faith; all are answered by knowing what to believe, hope for, and love.
5. 5Faith is the beginning and sight the goal; the foundation of the catholic faith is Christ, who is present among heretics in name only.
6. 6A handbook cannot also defend the faith against opponents; that needs fuller study and zeal.
7. 7The Creed and the Lord's Prayer contain faith, hope, and love: faith believes, hope and love pray.
8. 8Faith differs from hope, since faith concerns good and evil, past, present, and future, while hope concerns only one's own future good; yet love, hope, and faith cannot exist without one another.
9. 9A Christian need not know natural science, but must believe that the goodness of the one God, the Trinity, is the cause of all created things.
10. 10The supremely good Trinity created all things good, and together very good.
11. 11Evil, well ordered, sets off the good, and God permits it because he can make good out of evil; evil is nothing but the privation of good.
12. 12Every nature is good, and corruption, which is evil, can destroy the good only by destroying the nature itself.
13. 13There is no evil without some good in which it exists, so an evil man is an evil good: good as a man, evil as unrighteous.
14. 14Unlike other contraries, good and evil exist together, for evil arises from and exists only in what is good.
15. 15That evil arises from good does not contradict “a good tree cannot bear evil fruit,” for from man's good nature either a good or an evil will can spring.
16. 16Happiness requires knowing not the causes of nature's great motions but the causes of good and evil, so far as this helps us escape error and trouble.
17. 17Error is thinking one knows what one does not; some errors, like Augustine's wrong turn that escaped a Donatist ambush, do no harm, yet error belongs to this wretched life, and the liar harms himself most.
18. 18Every lie is a sin, but lies differ greatly by intent and subject; lying about worldly matters is less evil than being deceived about matters essential to worshipping God.
19. 19Errors range from gravely harmful to harmless or even beneficial in their results, yet error in itself is always an evil.
20. 20Augustine leaves open whether harmless mistakes are sins and rejects the Academics' suspension of all assent, since faith requires assent and much, like the fact that we live, is certain.
21. 21Errors in matters irrelevant to the kingdom of God are no sin, or a very slight one, and do not leave the way of faith, but they belong to the misery of this life.
22. 22Every lie is a sin, since speech exists to convey thought, and good results no more justify a lie than they justify theft or adultery; those who lie only to save life deserve pardon, not praise.
23. 23The cause of all good is God's goodness, and the cause of evil is the will of a changeable creature, first angel then man, falling away from the unchangeable good.
24. 24From the first fall followed ignorance, harmful desire, error, pain, fear, and false joy, the sources of all the misery of rational nature.
25. 25Fallen nature keeps its desire for happiness; besides the evils shared with fallen angels, man suffers bodily death, the penalty God threatened when he gave him free choice in paradise.
26. 26Adam's sin vitiated his whole stock, so that all born of him through carnal concupiscence contract original sin and its penalty, as Rom 5:12 says.
27. 27The whole human race was a condemned mass under God's just wrath, sustained by his goodness; God would have been just to abandon it forever, but chose to show undeserved mercy.
28. 28The proud angels fell, but the rest, not bound by any inherited guilt, remained faithful and received certain knowledge of their eternal security.
29. 29God willed that part of the human race be restored to fill the places in the heavenly city left by the fallen angels, a number known to God alone.
30. 30Fallen man cannot be restored by his works or his free choice, which he lost in sinning; true freedom to do good comes only when the Son sets him free by grace.
31. 31Faith too is God's gift, and good works follow from his grace, which makes us not men, as at creation, but good men.
32. 32Even the good will is God's gift: “not of him who wills but of God who shows mercy” means the whole is given to God, whose mercy goes before the unwilling and follows the willing.
33. 33All were born children of wrath through original sin and needed a mediator whose unique sacrifice would reconcile them; God's “wrath” means his just vengeance, not a disturbed feeling.
34. 34The Word became flesh by taking up a whole human nature free of sin, conceived by a virgin through faith, whose virginity remained intact in his birth.
35. 35Christ is one person, both God and man: equal to the Father as the Word, less than the Father as man.
36. 36The union of a human nature with the Son, with no prior merit, shows the free grace by which we too are justified; Mary was full of grace to be the Lord's mother, Christ full of grace and truth.
37. 37Christ's human birth from the Holy Spirit, the gift equal to the giver, shows grace, as the annunciations to Mary and Joseph declare.
38. 38Christ born of the Holy Spirit is not the Spirit's son; the whole Trinity made his humanity, and he was born of the Spirit not as of a father but of Mary as of a mother.
39. 39Not everything born of something is its son, nor is every son born of the one whose son he is called; so Christ, born of the Spirit, is the Son of the Father.
40. 40Christ's birth from the Spirit, not as his son, signifies the grace by which his humanity was united to the Word from its first moment without prior merit, so that it could admit no sin.
41. 41Christ, sinless in conception and life, was “made sin,” that is, a sacrifice for sin, so that we might become God's righteousness in him and rise to new life.
42. 42Baptism makes believers of every age die to sin and rise to new life, as Christ died and rose.
43. 43Baptism is for all ages: infants die in it to original sin, adults also to their own sins.
44. 44Scripture and poetry use the singular for the plural and the reverse, so “dying to sin” covers many sins, and “remission of sins” in infant baptism means the one original sin.
45. 45Adam's one sin contained many: pride, sacrilege, murder, spiritual fornication, theft, and avarice.
46. 46Infants may also be bound by their own parents' sins until regeneration; rebirth exists because birth is faulty, as Ps 51:5 says even of one born in lawful marriage.
47. 47Augustine leaves undecided whether the sins of all one's ancestors are inherited or whether God limits this to the third and fourth generation.
48. 48Adam's sin, which condemned the whole race, is washed away only through Christ, the one mediator, who alone needed no rebirth.
49. 49John's baptism did not regenerate; Christ, needing no rebirth, accepted baptism out of humility and death without sin, so that the devil might justly lose those he held.
50. 50Adam brought one sin into the world, but Christ took away that sin and all others added to it.
51. 51All born of Adam are under condemnation, and only those reborn in Christ are freed.
52. 52Romans 6 shows that baptism is a likeness of Christ's death and resurrection, so that all the baptized, infants included, die to sin and live to God.
53. 53Christ's cross, burial, resurrection, ascension, and session are patterns for the Christian life.
54. 54Christ's coming to judge belongs not to the present life but to the end of the age.
55. 55“The living and the dead” may mean those alive and dead at Christ's coming, or the just and the unjust, since God's judgment can mean condemnation or vindication.
56. 56In the Creed the Church follows the Trinity as temple follows God; the Church includes the holy angels, and since the Spirit has a temple, he is God, not a creature.
57. 57No one in the heavenly Church is evil, and none has fallen since God cast down the angels who sinned.
58. 58Augustine confesses ignorance of the ranks of angels and of whether the heavenly bodies belong to their society.
59. 59How angels appear, whether in tangible bodies, inward visions, or dreams, is a hard question that may be discussed modestly but need not be settled.
60. 60More important is discerning Satan when he poses as an angel of light, which requires vigilance and dependence on God alone.
61. 61The earthly Church is redeemed by Christ's blood; though Christ did not die for the angels, human redemption reconciles men with them and fills the places of the fallen.
62. 62Through Christ's one sacrifice heaven is restored by filling the angels' places with men, and earth by renewing those predestined to eternal life.
63. 63The peace of heaven, which surpasses all understanding, will be known to us when we are equal to the angels; but God's own peace surpasses even the angels' understanding.
64. 64After baptism, which removes original and actual sin, the forgiveness of sins remains necessary throughout life, since even the saints, though free of crime, are not without sin.
65. 65Even grave crimes can be forgiven in the Church through penance measured by sorrow; church leaders rightly set times of penance, since sins are remitted only in the Church, which has the Spirit.
66. 66Forgiveness looks chiefly to the final judgment; in this life even the baptized suffer, and some sins are punished now, others reserved for later.
67. 67Against those who hold that baptized catholics who die unrepentant in grave sin will be saved through a temporary fire, Augustine argues from Paul and James that faith without works does not save.
68. 68The wood, hay, and straw of 1 Cor 3 are lawful worldly attachments whose loss brings grief; whoever keeps Christ as foundation is saved through the fire of such trials.
69. 69Augustine allows as a possibility, to be inquired into, that some of the faithful are purified by fire after death, but not those guilty of the crimes that exclude from the kingdom, unless they did fitting penance.
70. 70Alms cannot buy permission to keep committing grave sins; life must be changed, and alms propitiate God only for past sins.
71. 71The Lord's Prayer daily removes light sins, and also forsaken sins, provided we truly forgive others.
72. 72Alms include every work of mercy: feeding, clothing, visiting, counseling, forgiving offenders, and even corrective discipline given in mercy.
73. 73The greatest alms is forgiving from the heart and loving one's enemies; the petition of the Lord's Prayer is at least fulfilled by those who forgive whoever asks forgiveness.
74. 74Whoever refuses to forgive a repentant offender cannot expect God's forgiveness, as Christ, the Truth, declared.
75. 75“Give alms and all things are clean” does not cover the unrepentant or unbelievers, for only faith in Christ cleanses.
76. 76True almsgiving begins with mercy to one's own soul through rebirth and the love of God, which the Pharisees neglected while tithing herbs.
77. 77Alms cannot buy impunity for those who love their sins, for whoever loves iniquity hates his own soul; and even alms come from God's prior mercy.
78. 78God alone judges which sins are light or grave; Paul's concessions to the weak, on marital intercourse for pleasure and lawsuits between Christians, show these are pardonable sins, for which we pray daily.
79. 79Some sins that seem trivial, like calling a brother “fool” or observing lucky and unlucky days, are shown by Scripture to be grave.
80. 80Sins become thought trivial when customary, so that many now go without church discipline, as Augustine lamented in his commentary on Galatians.
81. 81We sin through ignorance or weakness and need God's help against both, praying for pardon and for guidance: the Lord is our light and salvation.
82. 82Even doing penance requires God's mercy, since shame often prevents it.
83. 83The unforgivable sin against the Holy Spirit is to die obstinately refusing to believe that sins are forgiven in the Church.
84. 84Every Christian must believe that the flesh of all people will rise to eternal life, though the questions raised are many.
85. 85Whether miscarried fetuses rise is uncertain; Augustine dares neither deny nor affirm that the resurrection will complete what was unformed.
86. 86When life begins in the womb may be unknowable, but whoever has lived can die and so will share in the resurrection.
87. 87Malformed births will rise with nature corrected, conjoined twins as two separate persons, each soul with its own complete body.
88. 88No matter of the body is lost to God; whatever becomes of it, it returns in an instant to the soul that first animated it.
89. 89In the resurrection God, like a sculptor recasting a statue, will restore the body from its whole matter without each particle returning to its former place.
90. 90Risen bodies will keep each person's recognizable features, and any differences among them will be harmonious, with nothing unseemly.
91. 91The saints' risen bodies will be spiritual, free of all defect and corruption, yet truly flesh in substance, in full harmony with the spirit.
92. 92Those not freed by the Mediator will rise in their own flesh to be punished with the devil; their unending suffering is the second death.
93. 93Both deaths result from sin; the mildest punishment will be for those with only original sin, and others will be punished in proportion to their sins.
94. 94Seeing the reprobate punished, the saints will know more fully the grace given them: freedom by undeserved mercy, condemnation by deserved judgment.
95. 95In the life to come it will be clear why God chose one and not another; nothing happens unless the Almighty wills it, by permitting or by doing it.
96. 96God does well even in permitting evil, since he permits it only by just judgment; otherwise he would not be almighty.
97. 97How can God will all to be saved when not all are? Not because human wills defeat his, for even when Jerusalem refused, he gathered those of her children whom he willed.
98. 98God turns evil wills to good by mercy or leaves them by judgment; Jacob and Esau, equally under condemnation, show election by free grace, not by foreseen works.
99. 99God has mercy by goodness and hardens without injustice; Paul's “O man, who are you?” is a real answer, since the whole race was justly condemned and the freeing of some is undeserved mercy.
100. 100God's will is fulfilled even through creatures' sins, which he uses for the condemnation of those predestined to punishment and the salvation of those predestined to grace.
101. 101A good will may differ from God's and an evil will coincide with it; God fulfills good purposes even through evil wills, as in Christ's death and Paul's sufferings.
102. 102The Almighty's will is never defeated and never evil, whether he shows mercy or hardens.
103. 103“God wills all men to be saved” means that no one is saved unless God wills it, or that he wills people of every kind to be saved; it cannot mean that God's will fails.
104. 104Foreseeing Adam's sin, God so ordered his will as to bring good from it, so that his good will would still be fulfilled.
105. 105Man was first made able to will good or evil; in the life to come he will be unable to will evil and so be freer, as the lesser immortality of being able not to die gives way to being unable to die.
106. 106Even before the fall man needed grace to persevere in righteousness; after it, free choice itself must be freed from sin by grace through faith in Christ.
107. 107Eternal life, though the reward of good works, is grace, since good merits are themselves God's gifts; Adam chose his own will, and God's will was done concerning him.
108. 108Only a Mediator who is both God and man could reconcile sinners, rebuking pride by God's humility, giving an example of obedience, opening grace, prefiguring the resurrection, and defeating the devil.
109. 109Between death and resurrection souls dwell in hidden places, at rest or in affliction according to their earthly life.
110. 110The Eucharistic sacrifice and alms offered for the baptized dead help those whose lives merited such help, as thanksgiving for the very good, propitiation for the not very bad, and consolation to the living for the very bad.
111. 111After the judgment the two cities, of Christ and of the devil, will last forever, with degrees of happiness in the one and of misery in the other.
112. 112Against those who soften the eternity of punishment, Augustine argues it is as eternal as the saints' life, allowing only that its torments may be eased at intervals; loss of God alone is the greatest punishment.
113. 113The eternal death of the damned, estrangement from God, will be common to all of them, as eternal life is to all the saints.
114. 114From the faith of the Creed springs hope, whose objects are those of the Lord's Prayer, for hope must be placed in God alone.
115. 115Matthew's Lord's Prayer has seven petitions: three for eternal things, begun here and perfected hereafter, and four for the needs of this life.
116. 116Luke's five petitions show how Matthew's seven are to be understood: the third repeats the first two, and deliverance from evil belongs with not being led into temptation.
117. 117Love, greater than faith and hope, determines whether a person is good; faith working through love asks for what it lacks, for the law commands but only the Spirit's gift of love helps.
118. 118The four stages of human life (before the Law, under the Law, under grace, in perfect peace) correspond to the history of God's people; even the righteous of old were saved only through faith in Christ.
119. 119Whenever regeneration comes, it forgives all past sins and original guilt; some receive God's help as soon as they receive the commandment.
120. 120One who dies after receiving the sacrament of regeneration, even before being able to receive the commandment, is not held by death, for Christ is Lord of the living and the dead.
121. 121Every commandment and counsel aims at love of God and of neighbor for God's sake; love grows as desire diminishes, and will be perfect when there is no more struggle.
122. 122Augustine closes the handbook on faith, hope, and love written for Laurentius.