Kingdom and Polity in Eusebius of Caesarea

1952 ◽  
Vol 45 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-66 ◽  
Author(s):  
F. Edward Cranz
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
New World ◽  
Human Society ◽  
City Of God ◽  
Christian Thought ◽  
General Answer ◽  
The City ◽  
Eusebius Of Caesarea ◽  
Pseudo Dionysius ◽  
Christian Society

Eusebius of Caesarea occupies a unique position in ancient Christian thought. His central problem is to explain and justify a Christian society which is to transform the Roman Empire and which will become the new world civilization supplanting Hellenism and Judaism. Earlier thinkers do not face this problem. The Roman Empire is for them one of the powers ordained of God, but it is pagan and they expect it to remain so. Consequently the question of human government is only peripheral to their thought. Nor do later thinkers see the problem quite as Eusebius does. In the East, for example in Pseudo-Dionysius and John of Damascus, the question of human government again becomes peripheral to Christian thought, and Eusebius has no successor as a “political theologian.” In the West, Augustine gives a general answer to the problem of a Christian society in a Christianized Empire, but his solution contradicts that of Eusebius. To Augustine, the structure of the Christian Roman Empire is still that of Babylon, and human society is still a mixture of two opposed cities, the earthly city and the city of God.

Aspects of Mediaeval Thought on Church and State

1947 ◽  
Vol 9 (4) ◽  
pp. 403-422 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gerhart B. Ladner
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Church And State ◽  
Special Kind ◽  
Human Society ◽  
City Of God ◽  
Two Cities ◽  
Love Of God ◽  
Heavenly City ◽  
The City

“Two loves,” St. Augustine says in De Civitate Dei, “have made two cities, love of self unto contempt of God the Earthly City, love of God unto contempt of self the Heavenly City,” the City of God. These “cities”—civitates—are, of course, not states, but societies; St. Augustine himself tells us that the term civitas is an equivalent of the term society. They are societies, however, of a special kind. The Ciyitds Dei is a “mystical” society of all the elect, past, present and future. The Civitas Terrena, the Earthly City, is identical neither with the earthly state nor with any particular earthly state such as the Roman Empire, nor with any merely human society, it too is a “mystical” society, that of the impious, the damned.

Introduction

2009 ◽  
pp. 1-14
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Near East ◽  
Philosophy Of History ◽  
The State ◽  
Divine Providence ◽  
City Of God ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The City

This chapter provides an overview of Book V of Augustine's The City of God. It analyzes how Rome has extended her imperial sway throughout Europe and the Near East in spite of the moral bankruptcy of the Roman state. It also reviews the solution offered by some philosophers about the expansion and consolidation of empire as the outcome of chance or fate. The chapter discusses how providence has endowed Roman leaders with traditional virtues that the aims of glory and honour for the individual, and dominion for the state that are at odds with Christianity's application of the virtues. It reviews the key to Augustine's philosophy of history, in which the Roman empire has spread and is maintained in existence by divine providence.

‘Where Were the Gods?’

2020 ◽  
pp. 96-123
Author(s):  
Gerard O'Daly
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Roman Religion ◽  
City Of God ◽  
Religious Issues ◽  
The City

The chapter analyzes Books 1–5, which are dominated by Augustine’s polemic against Roman polytheistic religion. Book 1 functions as an overture to central themes of the work, especially the contrast between the city of God, ‘an alien among the ungodly’, and the pride and desire for domination of the earthly city; it concentrates mainly on the moral and religious issues arising from Alaric’s sack of Rome in 410. The principal themes of these books are: pagan and Christian virtues; the moral deficiencies of Roman religion and the failure of the gods to protect Rome throughout its violent and disaster-prone history; God’s providential role in the success of empires, especially the Roman Empire; arguments against fate; Christian virtues and imperial rule.

On the City of Man

Worldview ◽  
1964 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 11-15
Author(s):  
Donald Brandon
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
Great Book ◽  
Philosophy Of History ◽  
The Other ◽  
City Of God ◽  
John Xxiii ◽  
The Future ◽  
Good Will ◽  
Pope John Xxiii ◽  
The City

St. Augustine wrote the City of God at a time of trouble for the Roman Empire. Pope John XXIII issued his Pacem in Terris “ to all men of good will“ in an age of universal conflict. While Augustine's philosophy of history includes a conception of an ideal Christian commonwealth, the predominant theme in his great book is pessimism regarding the City of Man. The strongest motif in the late Pope's encyclical, on the other hand, is optimism concerning the power of responsible men to shape the future in a favorable way.

scholarly journals Assemblage Thinking in Urban Studies: How to Conceive of a City?

2014 ◽  
Vol 12 ◽  
pp. 17-22
Author(s):  
Pavel Holubec
Keyword(s):  
Urban Studies ◽  
New World ◽  
World Order ◽  
Human Society ◽  
New World Order ◽  
Planetary Boundaries ◽  
Specific Kind ◽  
Object Based ◽  
The World ◽  
The City

Assemblage thinking is process-based thinking. Understanding cities from this perspective therefore implies searching for processes that are assembling the city and that keeps it alive. Because of this approach, we don't need to ask: „what the city is?“ but either: „how did cities emerge?“ or: „how is their existence maintained?“ The paper argues that the perspective, from which we see cities, matters, because it either highlights or hides something. We will argue, that the result of an object-based thinking about cities, that stems from modern order of the world, is a very finite and constricted notion of a city, that in effect precludes any alternatives. But by overcoming the obsolete notions of objects, objectivity and subjects by notions of assemblage, perspectivity and chaining, the new world order may eventually emerge and resolve also the mounting enviromental and social problems. We understand city as a specific kind of creature that, through imposition of limits, has helped the human society to differentiate and become global. But now is the time to limit the city, acknowledge planetary boundaries and this way force the global society to develop itself so it can adapt to the challenges of the Anthropocene.

scholarly journals Cezarea/Wieża Stratona w wybranych źródłach pisanych

Vox Patrum ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 57 ◽  
pp. 297-307
Author(s):  
Daria Keiss-Dolańska
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
History Of ◽  
The City ◽  
Eusebius Of Caesarea

In my paper I have tried to present briefly a history of Caesarea in Palestine, relying on the Greek and Latin sources. Originally, the city was called Straton’s Tower, but it became famous in the Roman Empire as Caesarea. I have described briefly how did Caesarea change from a small village to the capital of province Palestina Prima Metropolis. Among the authors who were used as the sources are Flavius Josephus, Georgios Synkellos, Eusebius of Caesarea, Procopius of Caesarea, Procopius of Gaza and Johannes Malalas.

Imperiumand the City of God: Augustine on Church and Empire

2018 ◽  
Vol 54 ◽  
pp. 46-70
Author(s):  
Gillian Clark
Keyword(s):  
At Risk ◽  
Roman Empire ◽  
Christian Ethics ◽  
Fifth Century ◽  
City Of God ◽  
Two Cities ◽  
Roman Africa ◽  
Heavenly City ◽  
The City

In early fifth-century Roman Africa, Augustine faced pagan opponents who thought that the Roman empire was at risk because Christian emperors banned the worship of its gods, and that Christian ethics were no way to run an empire. He also faced Christian opponents who held that theirs was the true Church, and that the Roman empire was the oppressive power of Babylon. For Augustine, Church and empire consist of people. Everyone belongs either to the heavenly city, the community of all who love God even to disregard of themselves, or to the earthly city, the community of all who love themselves even to disregard of God. The two cities are intermixed until the final judgement shows that some who share Christian sacraments belong to the earthly city, and some officers of empire belong to the heavenly city. Empire manifests the earthly city's desire to dominate, butimperium, the acknowledged right to give orders, is necessary to avoid permanent conflict. Empire, like everything else, is given or permitted by God, for purposes we do not know.

Augustine: De Civitate Dei The City of God Book V

2009 ◽  
Author(s):  
P. G. Walsh
Keyword(s):  
Roman Empire ◽  
English Translation ◽  
Final Section ◽  
Near East ◽  
Latin Text ◽  
City Of God ◽  
History Of ◽  
The City

This edition of St. Augustine's The City of God (De Civitate Dei) is the only one in English to provide a text and translation as well as a detailed commentary of this most influential document in the history of western Christianity. In Book V, Augustine searches out and presents an answer to the question which lies behind the earlier books. In spite of the moral bankruptcy of the Roman state, and in spite of the disasters and injustices which have marked her history since the foundation, Rome has extended her imperial sway throughout Europe and the Near East. If the pagan gods have not guided her to this terrestrial eminence, how has this success been achieved? Augustine divides his response into four main sections: addressing the pagan notion of fate; arguing that God aided the Romans to imperial glory because a minority of them were virtuous even though they did not worship him; stating explicitly that the Roman Empire was set in place by God and is governed by his providence; and devoting the final section to the advent of Christian Emperors. The edition presents Latin text with facing-page English translation, introduction and commentary.

Utopian Visions in United States Urbanism

Moreana ◽  
2005 ◽  
Vol 42 (Number 164) (4) ◽  
pp. 157-186
Author(s):  
James M. McCutcheon
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Los Angeles ◽  
New World ◽  
New Technology ◽  
World's Fair ◽  
Open Spaces ◽  
Central Park ◽  
Garden Cities ◽  
Oneida Community ◽  
The City

America’s appeal to Utopian visionaries is best illustrated by the Oneida Community, and by Etienne Cabet’s experiment (Moreana 31/215 f and 43/71 f). A Messianic spirit was a determinant in the Puritans’ crossing the Atlantic. The Edenic appeal of the vast lands in a New World to migrants in a crowded Europe is obvious. This article documents the ambition of urbanists to preserve that rural quality after the mushrooming of towns: the largest proved exemplary in bringing the country into the city. New York’s Central Park was emulated by the open spaces on the grounds of the Chicago World’s Fair of 1893. The garden-cities surrounding London also provided inspiration, as did the avenues by which Georges Haussmann made Paris into a tourist mecca, and Pierre L’Enfant’s designs for the nation’s capital. The author concentrates on two growing cities of the twentieth century, Los Angeles and Honolulu. His detailed analysis shows politicians often slow to implement the bold and costly plans of designers whose ambition was to use the new technology in order to vie with the splendor of the natural sites and create the “City Beautiful.” Some titles in the bibliography show the hopes of those dreamers to have been tempered by fears of “supersize” or similar drawbacks.

Mexico — the «city of palaces» of the New World

2018 ◽  
pp. 94-106
Author(s):  
Julia Selivanova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
New World ◽  
The City
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