Ambivalence Within a "Totalizing Discourse": Augustine's Sermons on the Sack of Rome1

THEODORE S. DE BRUYN
Recent scholarship has explored the role of rhetoric in the Christianization of the ancient world. Particular attention has been given to "totalizing discourse"

whereby Christian interpretations of events subsumed or excluded other interpretations. Augustine's sermons after the sack of Rome attest to competing interpretations of the sack and to tension between the attitude of Augustine and attitudes in his congregations. The paper explores the way in which Augustine

deals rhetorically with the views of others, noting in particular his orchestration
of biblical themes and divine sanctions to construct an identity for Christians that is antithetical to that of pagans. The persistence of dissent, even as it is rep-

resented by Augustine, reveals the limits of rhetoric as a medium of Christianization.

The Christianization of the ancient world has been a matter of perennial

interest, and its many aspects have encouraged scholars to take an increasingly wide variety of approaches to the evidence.2 Recently, fresh attention has been given to the role of rhetoric. Rhetoric was, of course, a medium of
public life in the ancient world, and as such it was also a medium for the presentation of Christian values and beliefs. But how did these values and beliefs become prominent in public discourse in late antiquity, and what
1. Earlier drafts of this paper were read at a faculty seminar of the Atlantic School of Theology, at the 1992 meeting of the Canadian Society of Patristic Studies, and to a graduate seminar of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Ottawa. My thanks to the participants for their comments, as well as to Robert Sweetman, Lesley Smith, Calum Carmichael, and the readers of the journal for their criticism. 2. Danny Praet, "Explaining the Christianization of the Roman Empire: Older Theories and Recent Developments," SEJG 33 (1992-3):5-119, provides a convenient introduction to the literature.

Journal of Early Christian Studies 1:4 405-421 1993 The Johns Hopkins University Press.

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effect did this have on public life? This question has elicited a number of stimulating essays in recent years.3 In Christianity and the Rhetoric of Empire, Averil Cameron explores the ways by which Christians developed what she calls a "totalizing discourse"a comprehensive interpretation of reality which subsumed or excluded other interpretations.4 She submits that the "figurai quality of Christian expression, and the theory of reference on which it rested, were major enabling factors in its development toward a totalizing discourse."5 This figurai quality derived in large part from the Scriptures, which presented the Christian preacher and writer with stories, images, and metaphors that were at once authoritative and mysterious. While the Scriptures, as the revelation of God, were the basis for the truths proclaimed by Christians, they also required interpretation. But interpretation necessarily meant a loss of ambiguity and an increase of definition, with a concomitant transfer of authority from the Scriptures to their interpreters. Hence the movement toward a "totalizing discourse." But how were such interpretations received by their intended audiences? This is a crucial question for those interested in the process of Christianization. The present paper takes one sounding. It examines sermons that Augustine preached in response to the sack of Rome.6 In these sermons we
3. Robert A. Markus, The End of Ancient Christianity (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990); Averil Cameron, Christianity and the Rhetoric of Empire: The

Development of Christian Discourse (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1991); Peter Brown, Power and Persuasion in Late Antiquity: Towards a Christian Empire (Madison, Wis.: The University of Wisconsin Press, 1992). 4. Seeesp. pp. 23,57-8,217-20. On the contribution of Michel Foucault's studies of discourse and power see further Averil Cameron, "Redrawing the Map: Early Christian Territory After Foucault," JRS 76 (1986):266-71.
5. Cameron, Christianity, 58. 6. Serm. 33k (= serm. Den. 23; CCSL 41.417-22); serm. 15A (= serm. Den. 21; CCSL 41.20211); serm. 113A (= serm. Den. 24; Miscellanea Agostiniana [Rome:

Typis Polyglottis Vaticanis, 1930-1], 1:141-55); semz. 81 (PL38.499-506); serm. 296 (= serm. Casin. I, 133138; Miscellanea Agostiniana, 1:401-12; cf. Otto Zwierlein, "Der Fall Roms im Spiegel der Kirchenvter," ZPE 32 (1978):48-80, esp. . 63); serm.
105 (PL 38.618-25); exc. urb. (CCSL 46.243-62); and serm. 25 (CCSL 41.334-9).

For this system of reference, as well as literature pertaining to the dates and locations of these sermons, see Pierre-Patrick Verbrakken, Etudes critiques sur les sermons authentiques de saint Augustin (The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff and Steenbruge: In Abbatia S. Petri, 1976). The dating of the sermons is controverted; the best case is made by Othmar Perler, with Jean-Louis Maier, Les Voyages de saint Augustin (Paris: Etudes Augustiniennes, 1969), 397-405. Studies of the sermons are numerous. See esp. Rudolph Arbesmann, "The Idea of Rome in the Sermons of St. Augustine," Augustiniana 4 (1954):305-24; Franz G. Maier, Augustin und das antike Rom (Tbingen: W. Kohlhammer, 1955), 43-68; Jean Lamotte, "Le Mythe de Rome ville ternelle et Saint Augustin," Augustiniana 11 (1961):225-60; Pierre Courcelle, Histoire littraire des

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find represented the distress and complaints of Christians, the accusations of pagans, and the attitudes and arguments of Augustineall part of a rhetorical strategy meant to deal with the stresses that emerged in the aftermath to the sack. The representation of these various parties in the rhetoric is, of course, not symmetrical. Only Augustine's attitudes are conveyed directly; the attitudes of othersthe congregation, pagansare represented indirectly, as Augustine construed them. This was the acknowledged power of any rhetor, including the preacher, in the ancient world: to represent a situation to one's audience and, in the process, to shape the discourse whereby that situation is understood.7 However, it leaves us with the intriguing question as to how those who heard the sermons in fact responded to Augustine's representation of the situation something which must be inferred, as best one can, from the representation
itself.

What this paper explores, then, is the way in which Augustine represents the sack to his audience (giving particular attention to how Augustine

interprets the Scriptures) and, by inference, the way in which those who
heard the sermons responded to the sack. The dynamic between these two aspects of the sermons offers some indications of the process we call
"Christianization."

The first intimations we have of the impact of the sack are in two sermons Augustine preached in Hippo Diarrhytus in September 410 c.e., when, after his customary summer's stay in Carthage, he was returning to Hippo Regius.8 In Sermo 15A, preached on September 22,9 Augustine takes up the experience of adversity in a general way, echoing the views of his predecessors in the Latin Christian tradition.10 His point of departure is a verse of the psalm that has just been chanted: " 'Rejoice in the Lord, o you grandes invasions germaniques, 3rd ed. (Paris: tudes Augustiniennes, 1964), 6777;
Franois Paschoud, Roma aeterna: Etudes sur le patriotisme romain dans l'occident latin l'poque des grandes invasions (Rome: Institut suisse de Rome, 1967), 23945; Giuseppe Cannone, "Il Sermo de excidio urbis Romae di S. Agostino," VetChr 12 (1975):32546; Zwierlein, "Der Fall Roms"; Jean Doignon, "Oracles, prophties, on-dit sur la chute de Rome (395-410). Les ractions de Jrme et d'Augustin," 7. See Gerald A. Press, "The Subject and Structure of Augustine's De Doctrina Christiana," AugStud 11 (1980):118-22. The term "audience" is used in the sense discussed by Chaim Perelman and Lucie Olbrechts-Tyteca, The New Rhetoric: A Treatise on Argumentation, trans. John Wilkinson and Purcell Weaver (Notre Dame and London: University of Notre Dame Press, 1969), 13-62. 8. Perler, Les Voyages, 278-80.
9. Perler, Les Voyages, 398.
10. See nn. 12-14 below.

REAug 36 (1990):120-46.

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righteous; praise befits the upright'"(15A.1, citing Ps 32.1).11 Buta problem soon emerges, expressed in the words of Psalm 72.13: the righteous doubt that God is indeed good to them, since the wicked appear to flourish

in spite of their misdeeds (15A.2). However, a solution lies close at hand in

verses 1617 of the psalm, when the psalmist sees that in the end the wicked will suffer unending torment while the righteous will enjoy eternal happiness (15A.2). The parable of the rich man and Lazarus is adduced as an example of this truth (15A.2;cf. Luke 16.1925).12 Augustine reproves those who are as likely to curse God in bad times as to praise God in good times (15A.3). He compares God to a teacher who alternatively encourages or cuffs his pupil for his own good, or to a father who disciplines his son so that he will be a worthy heir: "'the child he accepts as his own he scourges' " (15A.3, citing Heb 12.6).13 It would be better to submit to such a father than to run away and fall prey to a slave trader, whose flattery is intended to entrap one in servitude (15A.4). Augustine turns to Job, the paradigm for those who suffer, and, interpolating narrative with exhortation, retells at length how Job kept his faith in all his adversities (15A.5-7; cf. Job 12). The story culminates in the crisis between Job and his wife (Job 2.910). In Augustine's words, just as Eve was the medium whereby the devil tempted Adam, so Job's wife is the medium whereby the devil coaxes Job to curse God and die.14 But "Job among his ashes was better than Adam in paradise" (15A.7). Augustine cites his rebuke (Job 2.10): " 'You have spoken as one of the foolish women. If we have received good from the hand of the Lord, shall we not also endure evil?' " (15A.7).15 Like
11. The enumeration of the Psalms is that used by Augustine (i.e., the numbering of the Septuagint and the Vulgate); for most of the Psalms it is one behind that of modern English translations.
12. Cf. Ambrose, lob. 3.3.5-9 (CSEL 32/2.251-4); Luc. 4.38 (CCSL 14.119). Au-

gustine refers to the parable not only in this sermon, but also in the sermon preached three days later in Hippo Diarrhytus (serm. 113A.2), as well as the sermon preached in Utica on September 11 (serm. 33A.4); cf. . 42 below. 13. Cf. Tertullian, pat. 11.4 (CCSL 1.311; citing Rev 3.19); Cyprian, ep. 11.2, 5
(CSEL 3/2.496-7, 498-500); Ambrose, lob. 2.4.15, 3.3.9 (CSEL 32/2.241, 253-4),

Luc. 4.38 (CCSL 14.119). Augustine often cites this verse to explain why the just suffer tribulation. About a third of the thirty-six citations occur in the years 410 to 412; see

Anne-Marie la Bonnardire, Biblia Augustiniana: Le livre des Proverbes (Paris: tudes

Augustiniennes, 1975), 101-23, 199-200. On Augustine's use of the image of paternal discipline see Suzanne Poque, Le Langage symbolique dans la prdication d'Augustin
224.

d'Hippone: Images hroques, 2 vols. (Paris: tudes Augustiniennes, 1984), 1:19314. Cf. Tertullian, pat. 14.4 (CCSL 1.315); Cyprian, mort. 10 (CCSL 3A.21), bono
pat. 18 (CCSL 3A.128-9); Ambrose, lob. 1.2.4 (CSEL 32/2.212), Luc. 4.39 (CCSL
14.120).

15. The passage is among the five that Augustine cites most frequently from the

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the psalmist, Job blessed the Lord at all times; praise was always in his mouth (15A.7; cf. Ps 33.2). Augustine concludes by exhorting his congregation to submit to the counsel of God, whose purpose may often be hidden but must nevertheless be trusted (15A.8): "Therefore, brothers, be

upright of heart, that is, in nothing let God be displeasing to you" (15A.9).
There is no direct reference to the sack of Rome in this sermon, and, as has been noted, much of its substance was common to the Christian tradi-

tion of theodicy (most proximately, Ambrose). But it sets out the terms by
which Augustine expects his congregation to respond to adversity. At no point are they to doubt the goodness of God or question the purpose of God. Instead they are to assess the events of the present, which seem to favour "the wicked," in light of the expectations for the future, when the wicked shall be judged. They are to range themselves on the side of La-

zarus, the poor man who comes to rest in the bosom of Abraham, and on
the side of Job, who bears his adversities with unwavering faith in God. The latter, as Augustine represents him, is an especially compelling model for the audience Augustine had in mind: an audience of men accustomed to domestic authority, with the right to discipline and the power to disinherit.16 In one image Augustine presents the virtuous man and the obedient sonvalues it would be difficult for Augustine's congregation to gainsay; to complain of misfortune would be to capitulate to womanly
weakness.17

When he begins Sermo 113A, three days later, Augustine reiterates this eschatological point of view: "The faith of the Christians, which is ridiculed by the impious and the faithless, is this: that we say that there is
another life after this life, and that there is a resurrection of the dead, and

that in the end after the passing of this age there is judgement" (113A.1). But this faith is evidently under some pressure; it is "ridiculed by the impious and the faithless." Augustine tries to secure it by using the Jews as a foil (113A.1). Turning again to the parable of the rich man and Lazarus, Augustine compares the unwillingness of the Jews to believe in Christ

despite the testimony of their Scriptures with the intransigence of the rich
la Bonnardire, Biblia Augustiniana: Livres historiques (Paris: tudes Augustiniennes,
1960), 110, 129-30.

booktwenty-four citations in all, seven falling in the years 410 to 412; see Anne-Marie 16. See in general Thomas Wiedemann, Adults and Children in the Roman Empire (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1989), 25-39. For Augustine's representation of the patria potestas see Poque, Le Langage symbolique, 1:20510.

17. On the use of such rhetoric in constructing Christian identity, see Kate Cooper, "Insinuations of Womanly Influence: An Aspect of the Christianization of the Roman
Aristocracy," JRS 82 (1992):150-64.

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man and his brothers (113A.2).18 He urges his congregation not to respond
as they did, but rather to accept the gospel that defines them as Christians: Look, you have just heard from the gospel that there are two lives, one present, the other to come. . . . Do we believe what is read, or do we not believe?

Far be it from me to suggest of your charity that you do not believe. You are Christians, and you would not be Christians if you did not believe the gospel
of God. Therefore, because you are Christians, it is clear that you believe the gospel. We have heard what was just read out, "There was a rich man ..." (113A.3).

Augustine then expands on the parable to explain that it is better, as

believers, to accept the scourge of misfortune whereby God chastises his

children, rather than, as unbelievers, to endure the torments of hell (113A.3-4). Once again Augustine cites Hebrews 12.6 (113A.4). In what follows Augustine exhorts his congregation at length to trust in

the prophecies and promises of God (113A.510). But a complaint intrudes: "'See how many misfortunes there are in Christian times! There was such an abundance of good things before Christian times! There were not so many misfortunes' " (113A.11).19 Augustine represents these complainers as the dregs from the olive press, drained off into the gutter, black and bitter and useless; or as the dross burnt to ashes in the blast furnace (113A.11).20 Augustine challenges his congregation to choose what they would be, gold or dross (113A.11). Nevertheless, he must deal with the complaint, suggesting that it carried weight with his congregation; like their pagan neighbours, Christians expected material benefits from religious observances, and grumbled when their God seemed oblivious to the prosperity of their enemies (113A.12). To underscore the difference between pagan and Christian piety, Au18. On this representation of the Jews, and its function in early Christianity, see now Gavin I. Langmuir, History, Religion, and Antisemitism (Berkeley, Los Angeles, Oxford: University of California Press, 1990), 275-87. 19. The phrase "Christian times" first surfaces as a term of reproach in Augustine's
writing in cons, euang. 1.33.51 (CSEL 43.55-6). On its various connotations in Au-

gustine's writings, see Goulven Madec, " 'Tempora Christiana.' Expression du triomphalisme chrtien ou rcrimination paenne?" in Scientia Augustinana: Studien ber Augustinus, der Augustinismus und den Augustinerorden, ed. Cornelius P. Mayer and Willigis Eckermann (Wrzburg: Augustinus-Verlag, 1975), 112-36. Cf. also serm. 80.8 (PL 38.498), and serm. 346C.1 (= serm. Call. 11.96; Miscellanea Agostiniana, 1:2723), preached around the time of the sack, but of uncertain date (Adalbert Kunzelmann, "Die Chronologie der Sermones des hl. Augustinus," in Miscellanea Agostiniana,
2:500).

20. On the image of the olive press and the blast furnace see Poque, Le Langage symbolique, 1:15775.

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gustine adverts to the amphitheatre in Hippo Diarrhytus and redefines the perspective from which it should be viewed: "Stop a moment, brothers, and look at that amphitheatre, how it is going to ruin! Extravagance built it. You think that piety built it? It was built by none other than the extravagance of godless men. Don't you wish that what extravagance built will sometime fall down, and that what piety builds will rise ?" ( 113 A. 13 ). This rhetorical counterpoint to the complaints about Christian times can be read as much as evidence of the significance of these monuments in civic life as of their dilapidation. Archaeological remains indicate that public works declined somewhat in the first decades of the fifth century, probably because of the pressures of financing campaigns against barbariansbut this after a century of general prosperity.21 Local notables in Carthage and other towns continued to offer entertainments, and Christians continued to enjoy them, despite the reproach they drew on such occasions from Augustine.22 Hence the insistence that Christians disassociate themselves from their neighbours"Choose for yourself what you would be!" (113A.11)and the transposition of piety from a classical virtue expressed in evergetism"extravagance"to a Christian virtue expressed in charity.23 Augustine concludes the sermon by urging his congregation not to wea-

ry of the blows of God, lest they perish for eternity; instead, they should
pray that God might temper his discipline so that they do not collapse beneath it ( 113 A. 14). He evokes Christ as the supreme example of one who suffered patiently and who thereby opened the way to heaven: his way is the
only way (113A.14).

Thus far Augustine has not referred directly to the sack of Rome. This changes with Sermo 81, preached in Hippo Regius in October or November.24 tudes Augustiniennes, 1979-1981), 1:108-11.
21. See Claude Lepelley, Les Cits de Afrique romaine au bas-empire, 2 vols. (Paris:

22. See Lepelley, Les Cits, 1:316-18, 2:44-7.

23. This, however, was less radical in fact than in rhetoric; see Lepelley, Les Cits, 1:37688; cf. Rita Lizzi, "Ambrose's Contemporaries and the Christianization of
Northern Italy," JRS 80 (1990):164-5.

24. Perler, Les Voyages, 400-1. Though the debate about the sack of Rome appears to have been more heated in Carthage than elsewhere, one should not overstate the contrast. The pagan character of Hippo Regius was much in evidence (Peter Brown, Augustine of Hippo [Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1967], 189-90), and, as the second port of Africa, the city also received refugees from Rome (Perler, Les Voyages, 280-1). Moreover, a common aristocratic culture is indicated by Marcellinus's notice of a landowner from Hippo who reported to his circle in Carthage, of which the pagan Volusianus was a member, that he had not been satisfied by Augustine's replies to his questions, though he had apparently acquired an ironic regard for Augustine's abilities (Augustine, ep. 136.3 [CSEL 44.96]).

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Again Augustine deals with the complaint, already noted in Sermo 113A, about "Christian times" (81.79). But now the complaint, as represented by Augustine, seems closer at hand. It comes from a friend or a confidant, from a servant or a fellow-servant, from one's patron (81.7). Furthermore,

the line between pagan and Christian begins to blur; "bad Christians" complain as well as pagans (81.8). Augustine is facing a community divided in its sense of the what the sack portends, with Christians sympathet-

ic to, as well as troubled by, views usually attributed to pagans. Though there is evidence of apocalyptic expectations in Christian writings of the
fourth and fifth centuries,25 Augustine's congregation seems to have difficulty defending the notion not only that the world might come to an end in Christian times, but that it might come to an end at all.26 In the face of this common feeling, Augustine alters his response. After reminding his congregation that they should not be surprised by the end of the worldit had, after all, been foretold by Christ (81.8)he takes up the question of the fate of the city of Rome. "Perhaps," he suggests, "Rome has not perished; perhaps it has been scourged, but not destroyed; perhaps it has been chastised, but not demolished" (81.9). This is a concession to

the value which allpagan and Christian alikeinvested in the city. But
Augustine immediately veers away from too literal a view of the eternity of the city. He takes up topoi o- Stoic consolation long familiar to Christian apologists.27 Rome is not merely a city of wood and stone; it is a city of people, and they will not perish if they praise God. Moreover, to say that Rome will come to an end does no injustice either to the city or to its founder: the world was designed by God to come to an end, just as humankind was created mortal. And as for the accusation that catastrophe has befallen Rome in an era of Christian worship, Augustine, citing Sallust and Virgil, replies by querying the claims pagans make for their own gods:

"And when their conquered gods were carried to Italy, was it a protecting
presence or an ominous portent?" (81.9). The argument progresses from modest consolation for those who are anxious about the fate of Rome, to theological assertions about the transitory character of the world, to an ironic refutation of pagan assumptions. The aim, it appears, would be
25. See Henry Chadwick, "Oracles of the End in the Conflict of Paganism and Christianity in the Fourth Century," in Mmorial Andr-Jean Festugire: Antiquit paenne et chrtienne, d. Enzo Lucchesi and Henri D. Saffrey, Cahiers d'orientalisme, 10 (Geneva: Patrick Cramer, 1984):125-9; Doignon, "Oracles," 123-34. 26. See the summary remarks of Paschoud, Roma aeterna, 326-30, on the tenacity of
the myth of eternal Rome.

27. See Doignon, "Oracles," 139-40.

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gradually to break the sympathy that some Christians might have with the attitudes of their pagan neighbours or critics. This is certainly the aim of the sermon as a whole. From the gospel for the day Augustine focuses on the warning against succumbing to the pressures of one's neighbours"'Woe to the world for stumbling blocks!'" (81.1, citing Matt 18.7). The admonition is severe: "'If your eye causes you to stumble, if your hand causes you to stumble, if your foot causes you to stumble, ... cut it off, cast it from you'" (81.4, citing Matt 18.8). The example of Job and his wife has already been evoked (81.2); Augustine reinforces it with the example of Peter (81.4). As Jesus turned against Peter" 'Get behind me, Satan; you are a stumbling block to me' " (Matt 16.213)so should the Christian paterfamilias turn against those who with good but misguided intentionsfriend, father, son, wifewould persuade him to cave in to a more powerful man (81.46). In short, through the language of the Scriptures Augustine presses his congregation to disassociate themselves from the values of their neighbours. Only then does he recall comparable themes of pagan consolation, thereby, finally, to undermine the terms of the complaint about the sacking of Rome. This concern to differentiate Christian from pagan is even more pressing in Sermo 296, preached on the feast of Saints Peter and Paul in Carthage the
next summer.28 The disillusionment of Christians who had fled Rome is

palpable in the sermon. These refugees had lost property and kin in the sack (296.8). They are inclined to agree when people ask why the memoriae o- the apostles and other martyrs did not save the city (296.6), an attitude reminiscent of pagans expectations of protecting deities.29 Augustine reproves them for their misconception of the efficacy of the memoriae. They associate the power of the martyrs too closely with their shrines, and err in expecting local temporal protection. If they rightly remembered the witness of the apostles, they would know that the apostles now dwell in heavenand that only after suffering martyrdom (296.67). The sufferings which befell Rome should likewise direct believers heavenward. Yet this reorientation of memoria30this shift from the physical to the spiritual, the temporal to the eternalfails to satisfy: "'But still,' you say,
28. Perler, Les Voyages, 287.

29. See Paschoud, Roma aeterna, 3301; cf. Ramsay MacMullen, Christianizing the Roman Empire (A.D. 100-400) (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1984),
59-60, 174 n. 41.

30. See Victor Saxer, Moris, martyrs, reliques en Afrique chrtienne aux premiers sicles. Les tmoignages de Tertullien, Cyprien et Augustin la lumire de l'archologie
africaine (Paris: Beauchesne, 1980), 128-9.

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wished it were otherwise.' What do you wish otherwise? wished that Rome had not suffered so much' " (296.7).

Augustine both acknowledges this feeling and combats it. One by one he
takes up questions he imagines his audience to harbour in their hearts, questions reputed to come from pagans but equally compelling for Chris-

tians. "And yet I see what you say in your heart: 'See, Rome is ruined, or
has been ruined and burned in Christian times. Why in Christian times?' " (296.9). "'But in the attack on Rome,' they say, 'so many Christians suffered so many evils' " (296.10). " 'But now,' they say, 'the human race has

been devastated more than ever before'" (296.11). Augustine does not
allow such confusion of feeling to continue. His diatribe is meant to differentiate pagan from Christian in the minds of Christians. He reminds them

of what the Scriptures, the primary referent for Christians, say, and chides them for forgetting its prophecies in the face of popular opinion: "I wonder whether you who are upset by this talk remember [what you have heard]. Have you not heard the prophets, have you not heard the apostles, have you not heard the Lord Jesus Christ himself predicting evils to come? . . . Why
do we contradict ourselves, that when these prophecies are read we believe, but when they are fulfilled we complain?" (296.10).

Eventually Augustine appeals to the closed space of the basilica to separate Christian from pagan: "Now, my brothers, let us leave the pagans
outside for a while. Let us turn our attention to ourselves" (296.11). This

appeal anticipates the profound change the African town would undergo in the fifth century. Gradually the centre of gravity would shift from the
forum to the basilica.31 But at the moment the basilica is vulnerable to the

pressure of the forum, and those who gather in it must be reminded of their identity: "Set aside the world, slave that it is, and listen to the gospel" (296.11). Augustine then develops the parable of the two slavesthe one knowing the will of his master, the other not knowing it, both disobedient (Luke 12.478)with reference to the world, which was ignorant of

God's will before the gospel was proclaimed, but is aware of God's will
now. Both "worlds" are "beaten," but those who know God's will are

beaten more because they know better. Augustine brings his argument
home: "Look, you know the will of your Lord, who wishes you to serve in heaven. But you are slaves of the earth, and deserve to be beaten. And when you are cudgelled, you blaspheme, you complain, and you declare that your Lord should not do what he does to you" (296.11). Once again Augustine invokes the unrelenting mercy of the divine father, exhorting the congrega31. See Yvon Thebert, "L'volution urbaine dans les provinces orientales de
l'Afrique romaine tardive," Opus 2 (1983):107-11.

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tion to praise him who does not spare them the discipline they would forego (296.11-12): "Better to be flogged than to be damned" (296.12).
In Sermo 105 there are signs that people in Carthage are beginning to tire of Augustine's interpretation of the sack.32 Augustine reports that some

complain of his (apparently incessant) preaching on the subject: "If only he

would shut up about Rome!" (105.12).33 It seems Augustine has certain "learned" disputantsdocti hominesin view (105.12),34 pagans like the one who, in the verbal picture Augustine draws earlier in the sermon, confounds his Christian friend when he asks him to explain his faith (105.2). In the gospel for the day, Luke 11.5-13, Augustine finds a fitting

image for his rhetorical contest with these pagans. The gospel asks the question, " 'Who among you, if your child asks for an egg, will hand him a scorpion?' " (Luke 11.12, cited at serm. 105.6). Expanding the image with
reference to biblical and natural observations of the care a hen takes for its

young, Augustine sees himself as representing the view of the hen (Christ; cf. Matt 23.37) that protects her egg (the hope of the Christians) from the scorpion's sting (those who blame Christ for the sack) by attacking and killing the scorpion (105.11-12). "Let them not become vexed," he says of his opponents;35 of himself he says, "We seem agitated, but we do not
return curses with curses" (105.12). His views on the sack, he continues,

do not issue from a lack of feeling for those who suffered from it: "Did we
not have many brothers there? Do we not have them there still?" (105.12). Rather, he speaks out against pagan accusations that "our Christ" is re-

sponsible for the sack of Rome (105.12). But, though Augustine's interlocutors in the debate over the reason for
the sack are pagans, the audience immediately before him in the sermon are Christians susceptible to pagan arguments. These Christians he admon-

ishes to place their hope in " 'the Lord who builds Jerusalem' " rather than
in Jove who falsely promised that there would be no end to Roman rule (105.910, citing Ps 146.2). The way in which their attitude is represented

by Augustine is at times hardly different from the attitude of pagans who

are said to influence them: "You grumble about these bitter sorrows, about
32. Perler, Les Voyages, 4034, argues that serm. 105 follows shortly after serm. 296. Augustine refers to Carthage at serm. 105.12. 33. Scholars are divided as to whether to attribute this protest to pagans (Arbesmann, "The Idea of Rome," 317; Cannone, "Il Sermo de excidio, 342) or Christians ( Paschoud, Roma aeterna, 2412; Zwierlein, " Der Fall Roms, " 63 ; Poque, Le Langage symbolique, 1:163). After some ambivalence I favour the former view; see n. 35 below. 34. On their culture see Brown, Augustine, 300-3.
35. "Non irascantur": this exhortation offers the clearest indication, to my mind,

that those who say, "O si taceat de Roma," are those who "propter istas adversitates blasphmant Christum nostrum" (serm. 105.11-12), that is, pagan critics.

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these afflictions, and you say: 'See how everything perishes in Christian times'" (105.8). Accordingly, the authorities Augustine cites to convince these Christians that eventually there would be an end to Roman rule include Virgil, whose integrity he rehabilitates even as he contrasts the veracity of God with the fraudulence of Jove (105.1O).36 But finally, as in previous sermons, Augustine must remind his congregation of their identity: "You are Christians, brothers, we are Christians. . . . Let no one by

grumbling turn you from the hope of the future" (105.11).

Thus far this "grumbling," as represented by Augustine, has consisted in

charges (from pagans) that the evils that have befallen the empire resulted
from disregard for the gods, in questions (from Christians as well as pagans) about the power of the God of the Christians in the face of such

disaster, and in competing interpretations (again, Christian and pagan) of pagan oracles and poetry. In the sermon On the Destruction of the City of
Rome there is, however, a vivid example of an unusual contest over the

meaning of the Christian Scriptures.37 The passage in question is the story

of Abraham's intercession with God on behalf of Sodom (Gen 18.16-33).

Augustine remarks on how attentive the congregation was when the story
was read as one of the lections (exc. urb. 2).38 As he continues, the reason for this attention emerges. A "vehement and formidable question" has arisen, based on the assumption that God would have saved Rome, just as he would have saved Sodom, for the sake of at least ten righteous individuals: " 'In such a great number of the faithful, in such a great number of chaste men and women dedicated to God, in such a great number of servants and handmaids of God, was it impossible to find fifty just people, or forty, or thirty, or twenty, or even ten?' " (2).39
36. On Augustine's use of Vergil here, see Carl P. E. Springer, "Augustine on Vergil: The Poet as Mendax Vates," SP 22 (1989):337-43; Doignon, "Oracles," 141-3. 37. The sermon is now generally accepted as authentic; see Marie V O'Reilly, Sancti Aurelii Augustini De Excidio Urbis Romae Sermo: A Critical Text and Translation with Introduction and Commentary (Washington, D.C: The Catholic University of America Press, 1955), 46. The date and place of the sermon are, however, more problematic. Perler, Les Voyages, 399-401 and 456-7, argues for the latter half of 411 and suggests Carthage. Augustine's parenthetical remark at exc. urb. 7 that there are perhaps some present in the congregation who witnessed the earthquake in Constantinople in 395/6 (on which see Alan Cameron, "Earthquake 400," Chiron 17 [1987]:351-4) may be evidence that he is speaking to a congregation less familiar to him, and perhaps more cosmopolitan (but cf. . 24 above), than the one in Hippo Regius. 38. The best manuscript indicates that the lesson had been read that day; other manuscripts suggest that Augustine is returning to the lesson of a previous day; see exc.
urb. 2 (CCSL 46.250).

39. This translation and those which follow are by O'Reilly, Sancti Aurelii Augustini,
slightly revised.

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This is the first indication in the sermons that in the debate over the sack

of Rome the Scriptures were read in a way other than Augustine's. For

many of these sermons he may well have selected the readings. Our knowledge of the North African lectionary in Augustine's day is fragmentary, more complete for feast days than for other services.40 We can be sure that the gospel for Sermo 296, John 21.15-19 (296.1, 3), was that appointed for the day.41 On the other hand, the gospel for Sermo 113 A, the parable of the rich man and Lazarus at Luke 16.1931 (113A.2), was probably selected by Augustine. He had already spoken of it in two previous sermons that month42too close a cluster to be set by the lectionaryand it was a

familiar point of reference for Christian theodicy, offering an obvious opportunity to contrast temporal and eternal values in the midst of adversity. For the remaining sermons it is difficult to be certain whether the reading was appointed or selected, though the gospel for Sermo 81, Matthew 81.79 (81.1), has an evident bearing on the sack, whereas the gospel for Sermo 105, Luke 11.513 (105.1), is more remote. Nevertheless, in all these sermons Augustine works passages from the readings and from elsewhere in the Scriptures into an exposition of what he believes to be the truth of the Scriptures. In this sense he "controls" the narrative of the Scriptures and the construction of values that it sustains.43 With the story of the destruction of Sodom, Augustine faces competition. From the mocking way in which the question is put, derisive as it is of the ascetic exemplars of the Christian faith, it would appear that the competition comes from pagans. Augustine discredits them as "people who impiously attack our Scriptures, not those who search them with reverence" (exc. urb. 2). (Eight years later, when Augustine again mentions the question, his language is more neutral.)44 At the same time he is aware, as already noted, that these "impious" people have the attention of his congregation. His response is, by now, familiar. He distinguishes, first of all, between Sodom and Rome: Sodom was destroyed and all the inhabitants of
40. See Geoffrey G. Willis, Sf. Augustine's Lectionary, Alcuin Club Collections, 44

(London: SPCK, 1962); Guy Lapointe, La clbration des martyrs en Afrique d'aprs les sermons de saint Augustin (Montreal: n.p., 1972); Saxer, Moris, 208-27, 31521.
41. See Saxer, Morts, 209-10.

42. See n. 12 above. The way in which Augustine turns to the parable at serm. 33A.4"Attende euangelium"may indicate that it had been read to the congregation, though the customary phrases that normally indicate a reading are absent; see Saxer, Morts, 224-5. The parable is introduced at serm. 15A.2 without any formula; the only reading of which we can be certain is Ps 32 (serm. 15A.1).
43. See Press, "Subject and Structure," 112-18.

44. Hept. 1.40 (CCSL 33.16). This is the only other time Augustine treats the question; he is silent about it, curiously, in the City of God.

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the city perished, whereas many of the inhabitants of Rome escaped (2). He acknowledges that what was reported by those who escaped was frightening (3), but nevertheless directs the congregation to the paradigm of Job, who presents a "great spectacle, and in that foul putrefaction, magnificent beauty of virtue" (3). Unlike the old Adam, he did not succumb to the counsel of the new Eve, who became the helpmate of the devil rather than her husband. Job saw that his present torment was nothing compared to
the torment of hell. He saw that it is the same father who soothes and

reproves, who promises life and inflicts punishment. He did not ask why this suffering befell him; on the contrary, he acknowledged his sin (4), as did Daniel, with whom Augustine began the sermon (1). None should presume to be wiser than Daniel, failing to acknowledge sin or the work of God in healing from sin (5). Augustine then turns to the question about the so-called "righteous" in Rome. Though by commonly accepted standards one may say that there were many righteous people in Rome, by the standards of perfection one cannot say that they were wholly righteous. Nevertheless, God spared Rome on their account. In addition, the righteous who died were also spared, for, like the poor man Lazarus, they have been received into divine peace in the bosom of Abraham (5). If only one could see them now, one would see how God had saved Rome, for a city is not its houses, but rather its inhabitants (6). The recent miraculous events at Constantinople, which some in the congregation are said to have witnessed, likewise manifests the judgement and the mercy of God judgement in threatening the city, mercy in sparing it when it repented (7).45 No one should doubt that God saved Rome. Many fled before the attack, others departed the body, others hid where they could, many were protected by the holy places. The city was chastised rather than lost (8). Its example should inspire a healthy fear that curbs insatiable desire for passing pleasures, rather than prompt one to complain against the Lord for the blows one deserves. Are Christians so weak as to be affronted by the sufferings of one city, when in Christ they witness the sufferings of one greater than the whole of creation? Are they afraid of the care of this physician (9)? In short, Augustine draws on his entire repertoire to respond to those who would use the story of Sodom to question the faithfulness of God. By

contrast, in Sermo 25 the outcry over the sack begins to fade once more
into general complaints about "bad times"maligni dies, a recurring refrain in the sermon (25.36). Again Augustine counsels the faithful not to envy the prosperity of pagans or grumble about the inequities of God's
45. See n. 37 above.

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providence (25.2) This life is a "land of the dying" (25.1); it passes like a rushing stream (25.6). Peace is not to be found in it, but in the life to come, which is in Christ (25.7). Let those who hope to be welcomed by him care for the poor and the hungry and the homeless who in the cold of winter hover around the doorway of the church (25.8)a reference, perhaps, to the lingering effects of the migration from Rome.46 These sermons are not, of course, Augustine's last word on the sack.

Augustine went on to reflect on the significance of Rome in other sermons

and in the City of God, whose first three books, a reply to questions occasioned by the sack, are just the prelude to a vaster evaluation of Roman

political culture. Throughout these works, as in the sermons of 41011, Augustine's rhetoric is characterized by a predilection for antithesis,47
leading those who study his thought as a whole to search for nuances.48 But in so doing one should not overlook the rhetorical moment of the sermons. When they were preached, they constructed a world for their

hearers in which the values of pagans and the values of Christians are
studiously contrasted.49 How accurately does this antithesis represent the Christianity of the

congregations to whom Augustine preached? The dominant impression

with which one is left from the sermons considered aboveperhaps more

dramatically from those preached in Carthage than from those preached in

Hippo Diarrhytus and Hippo Regiusis of Christians situated somewhere between the polar opposites drawn by Augustine, between the accusing

pagan and the exemplary Job. These Christians distinguished themselves from their pagan neighbours ritually by participating in the Christian
liturgy, thereby giving Augustine grounds to appeal to the authority of the Scriptures and to the boundaries of the community. More than that, some Christians distinguished themselves theologically andto the extent that
46. Perler, Les Voyages, 4045, argues that the sermon was preached in the winter of 411-12, when Augustine was back in Hippo Regius. 47. See, in general, the observations of Henry Chadwick in the Introduction to his translation of Augustine's Confessions (Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press, 1992), x. Augustine's inclination toward antithesis finds its leitmotif in the typology of Jerusalem and Babylon, long a feature of Augustine's preaching, but taken up with vigour after the sack of Rome; see Antoine Lauras and Henri Rondet, "Le Thme des deux cits dans l'oeuvre de saint Augustin," in Etudes Augustiniennes, d. Henri Rondet et al. (Paris: Aubier, 1953), 108-12, 114-24. A comprehensive study of this typology may now be found in Johannes van Ooit, Jerusalem and Babylon: A Study into Augustine's "City of God" and the Sources of his Doctrine of the Two Cities (Leiden: E.
J. Brill, 1991).

48. See Oort, Jerusalem and Babylon, 90.

49. See Markus, The End of Ancient Christianity, 107-23.

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religion was significant in public lifepolitically by seeking answers to the accusations pagans brought against their faith. Such Christians sought a specifically Christian response, though not necessarily an antagonistic one, inasmuch as those for whom it was intended are often represented as associates or friends. Not all, however, went even this far; rather, they

echoed the complaints attributed to pagans. In fact, the terms on which

Christians sought answers were similar to the terms of the questions put to them by pagans. For Christians, as for pagans, adversity was a sign of the displeasure of God. But such displeasure and such adversity did not correspond to the piety of those who honoured this God. Hence the expectations voiced about the memoriae of the apostles in Rome, or the analogy
drawn about the fate of Sodom.

The response Augustine offers is, however, less compromising than the one sought. Whereas his congregations appear to desire happiness in the here and now, he directs them to happiness in the life to come. What adversity they suffer now is explained as the judicious and beneficent discipline of God, intended to save the wayward from their sinful neglect of what is truly enduring. The prospect of eternal happiness is proffered in the stories of Job, Lazarus, and finally Christ. But the inducements presented in those stories are accompanied by the threat of punishment from God, either as chastisement now or condemnation for eternity. Indeed, the sanction of divine punishment is invariably a part of Augustine's eschatological vision, and is repeatedly invoked in the sermons on the sack. It does not seem to have convinced everyone, however. The experience of such "punishment" was evidently felt to be less salutary than its rhetorical representation;50 otherwise questions about the providence of God would not have arisen out of the experience of suffering. As the questions become more pointed, Augustine tempers his response to allow for fears for the welfare
of Rome or anxieties about the end of the world. But he does not alter his

basic eschatological perspective, with its polar outcomes for Christians and pagans. It is, for him, the truth of the Scriptures. The enigma of these sermons as evidence of the process of Christianization lies in the ambivalence of Augustine's representation of the attitudes of his audience. This ambivalence is especially noticeable in the questions
which are said to have bothered Christians after the sack. On the one hand

these questions are presented in a way that allows Augustine to construe the terms on which they should be understood and answered. The ques-

tions, in other words, are subsumed by the "totalizing discourse" of the

50. On anger rendered salutary by way of rhetorical representation, see Brown,
Power and Persuasion, 4858.

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sermons. But on the other hand the questions attest to the presence of views

which diverge from the perspective that Augustine sets out in the sermons.
Despite the way they are incorporated into the discourse of the sermons, the questions disclose the limits of that discourse. For the progress of

Christianization in the long run, it may be more important that Christian discourse purported to answer questions of the sort Augustine deals with
in these sermons; the discourse thereby framed the way in which the questions were to be understood, and the discourse could be reiterated long

after the experience which prompted the questions had faded. Nevertheless, the questions themselves point to the limits of rhetoric as a medium of
Christianization; rhetoric, to persuade, requires consent, and where there
is room for consent there is also room for dissent.5 l

Theodore S. de Bruyn is an independent scholar in Ottawa, Ontario.

51. See Perelman and Olbrechts-Tyteca, The New Rhetoric, 55.