In City of God, Augustine criticises Porphyry’s inability to locate a single universal way of salvation for all human persons – inclusive of the philosophical few and the non-philosophical many, the soul and the body, the individual and the community – finding fault with Porphyry’s unwillingness to accept that God has already provided such a way in Jesus Christ. Moreover, Augustine constructs a theological articulation of how the integral salvation of humanity by God in Christ begins, develops and comes to consummation as the city of God. This Augustinian criticism of Porphyry’s soteriological failure and constructive account of Christ’s soteriological success is the focus of Harmon’s recent study, which proceeds in three distinct yet interconnected parts.
In Part One, Harmon contextualises Porphyry’s versions of salvation within the political, religious and psychological transformations of Rome as it expands from city to empire. Deploying Shakespeare’s Roman trilogy to portray these transformations, Harmon evinces the emergent desire among imperial Romans for ‘a new sort of religion’ (p. 21) that benefits all humans and provides a private, otherworldly transcendence of political life. Within this context, Porphyry offers ‘three paths to salvation’ (p. 34) for differently inclined humans: 1) theurgy for the multitude ruled by the appetitive part, 2) continence for the immature philosopher ruled by the spirited part and 3) contemplation for the mature philosopher ruled by the rational part. Porphyry’s differentiated paths cannot outcompete ‘Christianity’s elegant and straightforward soteriology’ (p. 42), which Augustine endorses as furnishing a new transpolitical way of Roman life. Such an Augustinian endorsement begins in his early works, where he questions the usefulness of the Academy’s continuing esotericism and ‘the Platonic noble lie’ (p. 56) to the multitude. Such practices are particularly objectionable after Christ’s incarnation when the twofold love of God and neighbour has become available to heal intrapersonal fractures and transcend interpersonal divisions.
In Part Two, Harmon attends to Augustine’s diagnosis, in City of God, of humanity’s common punishments of the mind’s ignorance and the will’s difficulty deriving from original sin. Christ’s single, holistic remedy overcomes human sin, heals these self-inflicted wounds and makes available to everyone his eternal wisdom in and through his human flesh and ecclesial body. Whereas the Platonic philosophers ground the divisions between the few and the many in nature, Augustine traces them to the wounding of nature by sin. Furthermore, Augustine displays and surpasses the limitations of Porphyry’s soteriological versions that claim to treat only a part, not the whole, of humanity but, in fact, aggravate the disease of pride. By contrast, Christ’s universal way of salvation provides a purification process for the whole human – body, lower soul and higher soul – culminating in the eschatological resurrection of the human community. The ‘common aspiration’ (p. 122) of the Christian believer and Platonic thinker to see and cling to God, although now frustrated by ignorance and difficulty, is ultimately satisfied by participation in Christ’s humility and his Church’s sacraments and self-sacrifice. Only Christ’s gracious love can effectively heal the disorders of sin afflicting the earthly city and provide a transcendent and universal good that draws all kinds of humans together into a reconciled unity with God.
In Part Three, Harmon offers a reading of Augustine’s Confessions that tracks his experience of Christ’s soteriological way, advancing Augustine from a spiritual condition of pride, ignorance and difficulty to one of humility, faith and integrity. Motivated by Cicero’s Hortensius to pursue wisdom but detoured by the Manichaean fables, Augustine advances intellectually through natural and then Platonic philosophy whereby he conceives the idea of an incorporeal substance, makes distinctions between the body, the soul and God and recognises evil as privation originating in human free will. Despite having secured these intellectual truths, Augustine finds that philosophy cannot ‘heal his pride or overcome the consuetudo carnalis’ (p. 152) – the carnal custom that ‘sums up ignorance and difficulty under one heading’ (p. 150). In fact, Augustine’s heightened knowledge only exacerbates his proud self-inflation until he graciously accepts the humble way of Christ, who reintegrates his divided will and self-fragmented humanity. Augustine’s incorporation into Christ and his Church frees him to begin correctly loving God and neighbour, the absolute good and every particular good, as he strains forward in hope for the eternal life of God’s resurrected saints.
Overall, Harmon’s book provides an insightful historical contextualisation of the soteriological controversy between Augustine and Porphyry and theologically deep explorations of its contents. Occasionally, repetitions of quite lengthy quotations might feel somewhat taxing to the reader (e.g., pp. 86–87 and 104, pp. 73n.2 and 116, pp. 119 and 143). More substantively, Harmon’s framework invites further research to flesh out certain details that might have been tough to fit within a single volume. For example, Harmon well articulates the initial and final stages of Augustine’s engagement with philosophical groupings of humanity. However, additional work could illuminate the intermediate stage(s) for a more complete understanding of his development. Likewise, how Augustine’s pedagogical consideration of various audiences – whether more or less philosophically talented – shapes his teaching and preaching on the same topics but in different modes deserves further research springing from Harmon’s study. Nevertheless, Harmon makes a fine and welcome contribution to our grasp of Augustine’s critical and constructive articulation of Christ’s universal way of integral human salvation.
