The One Christ: St. Augustine's Theology of Deification (continued)
72 Made to be Godly himself, while some will try to become like God without God. Let us now turn to the deleterious effects of such de-imaging.
With regard to the divine image, our misdirected grasp at self-divinity affected the human person in two primary ways: first, it deformed the brilliance of our godly reflection and, second, sin moved us further away from God, placing us in a land of dissimilitude—a regio dissimilitudinis.99 The first effect of sin is primarily internal: distorting our inner lives, dimming our God-given reason and weakening our wills which were created to be intent on the good alone. The second effect has more to do with our relationship to the rest of creation. Augustine uses the metaphor of divine distance most effectively because by it, he captures our vocation to live through the world so as to see all creatures in the light of God: "Some persons are said to be far from him who became unlike him by sinning, and some persons are said to draw near to him who receive his likeness by living a pious life."100 The renewal of the divine image distorted by Adam's disobedience leads to a life of integrity. Augustine tends to combine these two factors, internal rejuvenation and outer conduct, with great effectiveness.
But whereas the ages of the world continue to fall into decay, God's love ensures that this disintegration will not hold sway over his creatures: "In your soul is the image of God; the human spirit is capable of receiving it. It did receive it, but by stooping to sin it defaced [decolorauit] the image. He who had originally formed it came himself to reform it, for all things were created through the Word, and through the Word the image was stamped upon us."101 Augustine often combines these
99. conf. 7.10.16; CCL 27.103. For more on this Platonic phrase (which, surprisingly, appears only here), see Eugene TeSelle, "Regio Dissimilitudinis in the Christian Tradition and its Context in Late Greek Philosophy," Augustinian Studies 6 (1975): 153–79.
100. ep. 187.5.17; Teske, Letters (II/3), 238. 101. en. Ps. 32, exp. 3.16; Boulding, Expositions (III/15), 416: "In animo tuo est imago Dei, mens hominis capit eam. Accepit eam, et inclinando se ad peccatum decolorauit eam. Ipse ad eam uenit reformator, qui erat eius ante formator; quia per uerbum facta sunt omnia, et per Verbum impressa est haec imago"; CCL 38.266.