Augustine in His Own Words (continued)
Against the Manichees 205 opposite is the case.9 His anti-Manichean writings were a crucible where he forged fundamental elements of his theology, and these would prove no less fundamental for later Christian theology. Six themes stand out: (1) the relationship between faith and reason, (2) the origin and nature of evil, (3) the freedom of the will, (4) the goodness of creation, (5) the relationship between the Old and New Testaments, and (6) the reality of the Incarnation.
Manichees in Their Own Voice
Augustine, on occasion, debated Manichees face-to-face. He has left behind the record of two such debates, one with a Manichean priest named Fortunatus, another with a Manichean teacher named Felix.10 But Augustine's most extensive debate was a literary one against a Manichean bishop named Faustus of Milevis (d. ca. 390).11 Augustine had first met Faustus around 382 in Carthage. According to Confessions, Book 5, Faustus's inability to answer Augustine's questions about philosophic and scientific weaknesses in Manichean thought was a decisive factor in his abandoning the sect. Sometime between 386 and 390, Faustus composed a question-and-answer treatise called Chapters (Capitula). Augustine preserved and rebutted this work in his Against Faustus the Manichee. These preserved fragments allow us to hear an eloquent Manichee in his own voice and in his own terms.
(i) Living the Beatitudes
Augustine says that Manichean missionary successes came, in part, from the attractive asceticism practiced by the Elect.12 One gets a glimpse of this as Faustus describes his commitment to living out Jesus' Beatitudes. From Faustus, Chapters, quoted by Augustine, Against Faustus the Manichee, Book 5:
(5.1) Faustus said: "Do I accept the Gospel? You ask me even when it's obvious that I do because I do what it commands. Maybe I ought to ask you whether you accept it, since one sees in you no evidence of accepting it. I—I have left father and mother, wife
9. A point stressed by Gerald Bonner, St Augustine of Hippo: Life and Controversies, 3rd ed. (Norwich: Canterbury, 2002), 193. See also J. Kevin Coyle, "Saint Augustine's Manichaean Legacy," 2002 St. Augustine Lecture, Augustinian Studies 34 (2003): 1–22.
10. Acta contra Fortunatum Manichaeum, and Contra Felicem Manichaeum; see Roland J. Teske, trans. The Manichean Debate, WSA I/19 (2006): 145–62 and 280–316.
11. Scholars typically speak of him as Faustus of "Milevis." Henry Chadwick has noted that ancient inscriptions give the town's name as "Mileu" or "MILEV"; see Eric Plumer, Augustine's Commentary on Galatians, 69 n. 53. 12. See De moribus 1.2 (CSEL 90:4).