Augustine of Hippo — Commentary on Scripture

Ecclesiastes 1:2

By this perversity of the soul, due to sin and punishment, the whole corporeal creation becomes, as Solomon says: “Vanity of them that are vain, all is vanity. What advantage has man in all his labor which he does under the sun?” Not for nothing does he say, “of them that are vain,” for if you take away vain persons who pursue that which is last as if it were first, matter will not be vanity but will show its own beauty in its own way, a low type of beauty, of course, but not deceptive. When man fell away from the unity of God the multitude of temporal forms was distributed among his carnal senses, and his sensibilities were multiplied by the changeful variety. So abundance became laborious, and his needs, if one may say so, became abundant, for he pursues one thing after another, and nothing remains permanently with him. So what with his corn and wine and oil, his needs are so multiplied that he cannot find the one thing needful, a single and unchangeable nature, seeking which he would not err and attaining which he would cease from grief and pain. For then he would have as a conseq…

By this perversity of the soul, due to sin and punishment, the whole corporeal creation becomes, as Solomon says: “Vanity of them that are vain, all is vanity. What advantage has man in all his labor which he does under the sun?” Not for nothing does he say, “of them that are vain,” for if you take away vain persons who pursue that which is last as if it were first, matter will not be vanity but will show its own beauty in its own way, a low type of beauty, of course, but not deceptive. When man fell away from the unity of God the multitude of temporal forms was distributed among his carnal senses, and his sensibilities were multiplied by the changeful variety. So abundance became laborious, and his needs, if one may say so, became abundant, for he pursues one thing after another, and nothing remains permanently with him. So what with his corn and wine and oil, his needs are so multiplied that he cannot find the one thing needful, a single and unchangeable nature, seeking which he would not err and attaining which he would cease from grief and pain. For then he would have as a consequence the redemption of his body, which no longer would be corrupted. As it is, the corruption of the body burdens the soul, and its earthly habitation forces it to think of many things; for the humble beauty of material objects is hurried along in the order in which one thing succeeds another. The reason why corporeal beauty is the lowest beauty is that its parts cannot all exist simultaneously. Some things give place and others succeed them, and all together complete the number of temporal forms and make of them a single beauty.

OF TRUE RELIGION 21:41

Ecclesiastes 1:3

If it is a vain thing to do good works for the sake of human praise, how much more vain for the sake of getting money, or increasing it, or retaining it, and any other temporal advantage, which comes unto us from without? Since “all things are vanity: what is man’s abundance, with all his toil, wherein he labors under the sun?” For our temporal welfare itself finally we ought not to do our good works but rather for the sake of that everlasting welfare which we hope for, where we may enjoy an unchangeable good, which we shall have from God, nay, what God himself is unto us. For if God’s saints were to do good works for the sake of this temporal welfare, never would the martyrs of Christ achieve a good work.

EXPLANATIONS OF THE PSALMS 119:38

Ecclesiastes 1:3

So this is what the rich should do: not be haughty in their ideas, nor set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on the living God, who bestows all things on us abundantly for our enjoyment; that is what they must do. But what are they to do with what they have? Let me tell you what: “Let them be rich in good works, let them be easy givers.” After all, they have the wherewithal. Poverty is difficult and grim. “Let them be easy givers”; they have the wherewithal. Let them share, that is, take some notice of their fellow mortals. “Let them share, let them store up for themselves a good foundation for the future.” “You see,” he says, “just because I say ‘Let them be easy givers, let them share,’ it doesn’t mean I want them looted, want them stripped naked, want them left empty. I am teaching them how to make a profit, when I point out, ‘Let them store up for themselves.’ I’m not telling them to do this so that they can lose it; I’m showing them where to transfer the account. ‘Let them store up for themselves a good foundation for the future, so that they lay hold of true life.’ …

So this is what the rich should do: not be haughty in their ideas, nor set their hopes on the uncertainty of riches, but on the living God, who bestows all things on us abundantly for our enjoyment; that is what they must do. But what are they to do with what they have? Let me tell you what: “Let them be rich in good works, let them be easy givers.” After all, they have the wherewithal. Poverty is difficult and grim. “Let them be easy givers”; they have the wherewithal. Let them share, that is, take some notice of their fellow mortals. “Let them share, let them store up for themselves a good foundation for the future.” “You see,” he says, “just because I say ‘Let them be easy givers, let them share,’ it doesn’t mean I want them looted, want them stripped naked, want them left empty. I am teaching them how to make a profit, when I point out, ‘Let them store up for themselves.’ I’m not telling them to do this so that they can lose it; I’m showing them where to transfer the account. ‘Let them store up for themselves a good foundation for the future, so that they lay hold of true life.’ ” So this one is a false life; let them lay hold of true life. After all, “Vanity of vanities, and all is vanity. What is this great abundance for man in all his toil, at which he toils under the sun?” So true life is to be laid hold of, our investments are to be transferred to the place of true life, so that we may find there what we give here. The one who transforms us also transforms those investments.

SERMON 61:11

Ecclesiastes 1:9

There are some people who want to twist even a famous passage in the book of Solomon, called Ecclesiastes, into a defense of these recurring cycles of universal dissolution and re-evocation of the past: “What is it that has been? The same thing that shall be. What is it that has been done? The same that shall be done. Nothing under the sun is new, neither is anyone able to say, ‘Behold, this is new,’ for it has already gone before in the ages that were before us.” But here Solomon was speaking either of things he had just been discussing—the succession of generations, the revolution of the sun, the course of rivers—or, at any rate, of those creatures in general that come to life and die. For example, there were people before us, they are with us now, and they shall come after us. And the same is true of animals and plants. Even monstrosities that are abnormal at birth, different as they are among themselves and, in certain cases, unique, nevertheless, inasmuch as they come under the heading of prodigies and monsters, have existed before and will exist again. Consequently, it is nothi…

There are some people who want to twist even a famous passage in the book of Solomon, called Ecclesiastes, into a defense of these recurring cycles of universal dissolution and re-evocation of the past: “What is it that has been? The same thing that shall be. What is it that has been done? The same that shall be done. Nothing under the sun is new, neither is anyone able to say, ‘Behold, this is new,’ for it has already gone before in the ages that were before us.” But here Solomon was speaking either of things he had just been discussing—the succession of generations, the revolution of the sun, the course of rivers—or, at any rate, of those creatures in general that come to life and die. For example, there were people before us, they are with us now, and they shall come after us. And the same is true of animals and plants. Even monstrosities that are abnormal at birth, different as they are among themselves and, in certain cases, unique, nevertheless, inasmuch as they come under the heading of prodigies and monsters, have existed before and will exist again. Consequently, it is nothing new or even of recent date that a monster should be born under the sun. However, there are some who interpret the words to mean that what Solomon had in mind was that, in the predestination of God, everything is already a fact and, in that sense, there is nothing new under the sun.Far be it from us Christians, however, to believe that these words of Solomon refer to those cycles by which, as these philosophers suppose, the same periods of time and sequence of events will be repeated. For example, the philosopher Plato having taught in a certain age at the school of Athens called the Academy, even so, through innumerable ages of the past at long but definite intervals, this same Plato and the same city, the same school and the same disciples all existed and will all exist again and again through innumerable ages of the future. Far be it from us, I say, to believe this.
For Christ died once for our sins; and “having risen from the dead, dies now no more, death shall no longer have dominion over him.” And we after the resurrection “shall ever be with the Lord,” to whom we say, as the holy psalmist reminds us, “You, Oh Lord, will preserve us: and keep us from this generation forever.” And the verse that follows, I think, may be suitably applied to these philosophers: “The wicked walk round about.” These words do not mean that their life will repeatedly recur in cycle after cycle as they think but that here and now the way of their errors, that is, their false doctrine, goes around in circles.

City of God 12.14

Ecclesiastes 1:14

We read in Scripture concerning the striving after temporal things, “All is vanity and presumption of spirit,” but presumption of spirit means audacity and pride. Usually also the proud are said to have great spirits, and rightly, inasmuch as the wind also is called spirit. And hence it is written, “Fire, hail, snow, ice, spirit of tempest.” But, indeed, who does not know that the proud are spoken of as puffed up, as if swelled out with wind? And hence also that expression of the apostle, “Knowledge puffs up, but charity edifies.” And “the poor in spirit” are rightly understood here, as meaning the humble and God-fearing, that is, those who have not the spirit which puffs up. Nor ought blessedness to begin at any other point whatever, if indeed it is to attain unto the highest wisdom. “But the fear of the Lord is the beginning of wisdom”; for, on the other hand also, “pride” is entitled “the beginning of all sin.” Let the proud, therefore, seek after and love the kingdoms of the earth, but “blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

SERMON ON THE MOUNT 1:1.3

Ecclesiastes 1:18

It is evident, then, that the oldness of the letter, in the absence of the newness of the spirit, instead of freeing us from sin, rather makes us guilty by the knowledge of sin. [Thus] it is written in another part of Scripture, “He that increases knowledge, increases sorrow.” [It is] not that the law is itself evil, but because the commandment has its good in the demonstration of the letter, not in the assistance of the spirit. And if this commandment is kept from the fear of punishment and not from the love of righteousness, it is kept in a servile manner, not freely, and therefore it is not kept at all. For no fruit is good which does not grow from the root of love.

ON THE SPIRIT AND THE LETTER 26

Ecclesiastes 1:18

People are accustomed to set a high value on the knowledge of earthly and celestial things. But they are certainly better who prefer the knowledge of themselves to this knowledge. And a mind to which even its own weakness is known is more deserving of praise than one that … is ignorant of the course by which it must proceed to reach its own true health and strength. But one who has been aroused by the warmth of the Holy Spirit … has already awakened to God. In his love for [God, such a person] has already felt his own unworthiness and is willing but is not yet strong enough to come to him. And through the light received from [God, this person] takes heed to himself and finds that his own defilement cannot mingle with his purity. [This person] feels it sweet to weep and to beseech God that he may again and again have pity until he has cast off all his misery. [This person also prays] with confidence as having already received the free gift of salvation through his only Savior and enlightener of humankind. For one who so acts and laments, knowledge does not puff up because charity edif…

People are accustomed to set a high value on the knowledge of earthly and celestial things. But they are certainly better who prefer the knowledge of themselves to this knowledge. And a mind to which even its own weakness is known is more deserving of praise than one that … is ignorant of the course by which it must proceed to reach its own true health and strength. But one who has been aroused by the warmth of the Holy Spirit … has already awakened to God. In his love for [God, such a person] has already felt his own unworthiness and is willing but is not yet strong enough to come to him. And through the light received from [God, this person] takes heed to himself and finds that his own defilement cannot mingle with his purity. [This person] feels it sweet to weep and to beseech God that he may again and again have pity until he has cast off all his misery. [This person also prays] with confidence as having already received the free gift of salvation through his only Savior and enlightener of humankind. For one who so acts and laments, knowledge does not puff up because charity edifies. He has preferred the one knowledge to the other knowledge; he has preferred to know his own weakness more than to know the walls of the world, the foundations of the earth, and the heights of the heavens. And by acquiring this knowledge he has acquired sorrow, the sorrow arising from his wandering away from the desire of his own true country, and from its founder, his own blessed God.

ON THE TRINITY 4, PREFACE

Ecclesiastes 3:5

Now this propagation of children which among the ancient saints was a most bounden duty for the purpose of begetting and preserving a people for God, among whom the prophecy of Christ’s coming must have had precedence over everything, now has no longer the same necessity. For from among all nations the way is open for an abundant offspring to receive spiritual regeneration, from whatever quarter they derive their natural birth. So that we may acknowledge that the Scripture which says there is “a time to embrace, and a time to refrain from embracing,” is to be distributed in its clauses to the periods before Christ and since. The former was the time to embrace, the latter to refrain from embracing.

ON MARRIAGE AND CONCUPISCENCE 14

Ecclesiastes 3:5

As for you, you both have children and live in that end of the world when the time has already come not “to scatter stones but to gather; not to embrace but to refrain embraces.” [This is a time] when the apostle cries out, “But this I say, brethren, the time is short; it remains that those who have wives be as if they had none.” Surely, if you had sought a second marriage, it would not have been in obedience to a prophecy or a law, or even the desire of the flesh for offspring, but merely a sign of incontinence. You would have followed the advice of the apostle, when, after having said, “It is good for them if they so remain, even as I,” he immediately added, “But if they do not have self-control, let them marry, for I prefer them to marry rather than to burn.”

THE EXCELLENCE OF WIDOWHOOD 8:11

Ecclesiastes 3:17

I ask you, then, are we to suppose that the only decree of God that will not come to pass, the only decree of God, will be the one which we read in those same writings as being about to judge between believers and unbelievers, when everything else that we read has happened as it was foretold? On the contrary, it will come to pass as all those other prophecies came to pass. Then there will be no person of our times who will be able at that judgment to find an excuse for unbelief when everyone shall call on Christ: the upright for justice, the perjurer for deceit, the king for power and the soldier for battle, the husband to maintain his authority and the wife to show her submission, the father for command and the son for obedience, the master for his right to rule and the servant for his subjection, the humble for piety and the proud for ambition, the rich man to distribute and the poor to receive, the drunkard at his wine cups and the beggar at the gate, the good person that he may excel in virtue and the bad one that he may cheat, the Christian worshiper and the pagan sycophant. All…

I ask you, then, are we to suppose that the only decree of God that will not come to pass, the only decree of God, will be the one which we read in those same writings as being about to judge between believers and unbelievers, when everything else that we read has happened as it was foretold? On the contrary, it will come to pass as all those other prophecies came to pass. Then there will be no person of our times who will be able at that judgment to find an excuse for unbelief when everyone shall call on Christ: the upright for justice, the perjurer for deceit, the king for power and the soldier for battle, the husband to maintain his authority and the wife to show her submission, the father for command and the son for obedience, the master for his right to rule and the servant for his subjection, the humble for piety and the proud for ambition, the rich man to distribute and the poor to receive, the drunkard at his wine cups and the beggar at the gate, the good person that he may excel in virtue and the bad one that he may cheat, the Christian worshiper and the pagan sycophant. All have the name of Christ upon their lips, and, with whatever intention and formula they invoke him, without doubt they shall render an account of it to him whom they invoke.

LETTER 232

Ecclesiastes 3:20

In order, indeed, that you may have the fullest and clearest assurance that what is the soul is in the usage of the Holy Scriptures also called spirit, the soul of a brute animal has the designation of spirit. And of course cattle have not that spirit which you, my beloved brother, have defined as being distinct from the soul. It is therefore quite evident that the soul of a brute animal could be rightly called “spirit” in a general sense of the term; as we read in the book of Ecclesiastes, “Who knows the spirit of the sons of men, whether it goes upward; and the spirit of the beast, whether it goes downward into the earth?” In like manner, touching the devastation of the deluge, the Scripture testifies, “All flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth, and every man: and all things which have the spirit of life.” Here, if we remove all the windings of doubtful disputation, we understand the term spirit to be synonymous with soul in its general sense. Of so wide a signification is this term, t…

In order, indeed, that you may have the fullest and clearest assurance that what is the soul is in the usage of the Holy Scriptures also called spirit, the soul of a brute animal has the designation of spirit. And of course cattle have not that spirit which you, my beloved brother, have defined as being distinct from the soul. It is therefore quite evident that the soul of a brute animal could be rightly called “spirit” in a general sense of the term; as we read in the book of Ecclesiastes, “Who knows the spirit of the sons of men, whether it goes upward; and the spirit of the beast, whether it goes downward into the earth?” In like manner, touching the devastation of the deluge, the Scripture testifies, “All flesh died that moved upon the earth, both of fowl, and of cattle, and of beast, and of every creeping thing that creeps upon the earth, and every man: and all things which have the spirit of life.” Here, if we remove all the windings of doubtful disputation, we understand the term spirit to be synonymous with soul in its general sense. Of so wide a signification is this term, that even God is called “a spirit”; and a stormy blast of the air, although it has material substance, is called by the psalmist the “spirit” of a tempest. For all these reasons, therefore, you will no longer deny that what is the soul is called also spirit. I have, I think, adduced enough from the pages of Holy Scripture to secure your assent in passages where the soul of the very brute beast, which has no understanding, is designated spirit.

ON THE SOUL AND ITS ORIGIN 4:37

Ecclesiastes 7:20

The following is one of the many arguments that Pelagius uses in treating this subject: “Once more I repeat: I say that it is possible for a person to be without sin. And what do you say? That it is impossible for a person to be without sin? But I do not say,” he adds, “that there is a person without sin, nor do you say that there is not a person without sin. We are disputing about what is possible and impossible, not about what is and is not.” Next he notes that a number of the passages of Scripture which are usually invoked against them do not bear upon the question in dispute, namely, whether or not a person can be without sin: “For there is no one who is free from pollution,” and, “There is no one that does not sin,” and, “There is no just person on the earth,” and, “There is no one that does good.” “These and other similar texts,” he says, “apply to nonexistence, not to impossibility. By examples of this kind it is shown how some persons were at a given time, not that they could not have been something else. For this reason they are justly found to be guilty. For if they were as…

The following is one of the many arguments that Pelagius uses in treating this subject: “Once more I repeat: I say that it is possible for a person to be without sin. And what do you say? That it is impossible for a person to be without sin? But I do not say,” he adds, “that there is a person without sin, nor do you say that there is not a person without sin. We are disputing about what is possible and impossible, not about what is and is not.” Next he notes that a number of the passages of Scripture which are usually invoked against them do not bear upon the question in dispute, namely, whether or not a person can be without sin: “For there is no one who is free from pollution,” and, “There is no one that does not sin,” and, “There is no just person on the earth,” and, “There is no one that does good.” “These and other similar texts,” he says, “apply to nonexistence, not to impossibility. By examples of this kind it is shown how some persons were at a given time, not that they could not have been something else. For this reason they are justly found to be guilty. For if they were as they were because they could not have been otherwise, then they are free from blame.”

ON NATURE AND GRACE 8

Ecclesiastes 7:29

The reason that we, being bad, have a good Father is in order that we may not always remain bad. No bad person can make a good one. If no bad person can make a good one, how can a bad man make himself good? The only one who can make a good person out of a bad one is the one who is always good. “Heal me, Lord,” he says, “and I shall be healed; save me, and I shall be saved.” Why do they say to me, silly people saying silly things, “You can save yourself if you want to”? “Heal me, Lord, and I shall be healed.” We were created good by the good God, seeing that “God made man upright.” But by our own decision we became bad. We were able to change from good to bad, and we shall be able to change from bad to good. But it is the one who is always good that can change bad to good, because man, by his own will, cannot heal himself. You don’t look for a doctor to wound you; but when you have wounded yourself, you look for one to heal you.

SERMON 61:2

Ecclesiastes 7:29

Let us be displeased with ourselves when we sin, because sins displease God. And because we are not in fact without sin, let us at least be like God in this respect, that what displeases him displeases us. Now you are displeased with that in yourself which he also hates who made you. He designed and constructed you; but take a look at yourself and eliminate from yourself everything that does not come from his workshop. For God, as it says, “created man upright.”

SERMON 19:4

Ecclesiastes 7:29

There is also a good world consisting of people, but made so out of a bad one. The whole world, you see, if you take the world as meaning people, leaving aside world in the sense of heaven and earth and all things that are in them; if you mean people by world, then the whole world was made bad by the one who first sinned. The whole mass is vitiated in its root. God made man good; that is what Scripture says: “God made man upright, and they themselves have sought out many devices.”

SERMON 96:6

Ecclesiastes 7:29

The Manichaeans deny that to a good man the beginning of evil came from free will; the Pelagians say that even a bad man has free will sufficiently to perform the good commandment. The Catholic church condemns both, saying to the former, “God made man upright,” and saying to the latter, “If the Son shall make you free, you shall be free indeed.”

AGAINST TWO LETTERS OF THE PELAGIANS 2:2

Ecclesiastes 8:14

In fact, Solomon gives over the entire book of Ecclesiastes to suggesting, with such fullness as he judged adequate, the emptiness of this life, with the ultimate objective, to be sure, of making us yearn for another kind of life which is no unsubstantial shadow under the sun but substantial reality under the sun’s Creator. For a person becomes as insubstantial as the insubstantiality that surrounds him, and it is by God’s righteous decree that he, too, must pass away like a shadow.

City of God 20.3

Ecclesiastes 8:15

Now, to be made a sharer at the table is to begin to have life, as we see from a text in Ecclesiastes: “There is no good for a man except what he shall eat and drink.” How can we reasonably interpret these words save as an allusion to partaking at the table which the Mediator of the New Testament, priest according to the order of Melchizedek, provides with his own body and blood? This sacrifice, indeed, has taken the place of all the sacrifices of the Old Testament that foreshadowed it.

City of God 17.20

Ecclesiastes 10:1

Indeed, it is said that Beelzebub means prince of flies; and it has been written of them, “Dying flies spoil the sweetness of the oil.”

TRACTATES ON THE GOSPEL OF JOHN 1:14.3

Ecclesiastes 10:8

Scripture says that there are deep things that must not under any circumstances be looked into, and the one who searches in a hedge will be bitten by a snake.

LETTER 12:10