Given to Matthew Hayes -05/03/2023

Not exactly gripping reading, for the most part, but thanks to this book I'm now very curious to learn more about Julian of Eclanum's claim that Augustine was a crypto-Manichean It seems entirely plausible: by trying to eliminate any vestige of good in humanity (so that it can all be attributed to grace), Augustine's argument logically tends towards the claim that evil was created by God. Simply put, if we couldn't have done otherwise, our deeds can't be attributed to us, but to the cause of our deeds, which is, even if by omission, God. Maybe Augie couldn't quite avoid his youthful ideas, after all. ( )

The century and a quarter following the Council of Nicaea (AD325) has been called the 'Golden Age of Patristic Literature'. It is this period that Henry Bettenson covers in this companion volume to The Early Christian Fathers, selecting from the writings of Basil the Great, Gregory of Nyssa, Jerome, Augustine of Hippo, Cyril of Alexandria, and other Fathers of the Christian Chruch. Their central concerns were to formulate the doctrine of the Trinity after the Nicene conclusions, and to enunciate the doctrine of the divinity ahd humanity of Christ. The writings served to clarify if not to solve the issues and they continue to be value and relevant for all who wish to understand Christian doctrine. As in The Early Christian Fathers, Bettenson translated everything afresh and provided some annotation and brief sketches of the lives of each of the Fathers represented in the selection.