St. Augustine - De Doctrina Christiana, Prologue & Book One

“Whoever, then, appears in his own opinion to have comprehended the Sacred Scriptures, or even some part of them, yet does not build up with that knowledge the two-fold love of God and his neighbor, has not yet known as he ought to know.”

“Everything which is not exhausted by being given away is not yet owned as it ought to be.”

This episode marks the beginning of an exciting new work on Catholic Culture Audiobooks: De Doctrina Christiana, or On Christian Doctrine, by St. Augustine of Hippo.

Though De Doctrina is a shorter work than Confessions or The City of God, it’s ranked right alongside them in significance — the three books together comprising St. Augustine’s contribution to the “Great Books of the Western World” list.

In this episode, we hear Book One in its entirety. Augustine provides, by way of introduction to the study of interpretation, an influential synthesis of Christian teaching based on the idea that only God should be enjoyed, as the source of true happiness, whereas all other things are meant to be used toward our true end. 

Over the course of the next few months, we’ll be releasing the other three books in two parts each — for a total of seven episodes, each about an hour or so in length. It’s the longest work we’ve tackled yet on this podcast, but we hope you’ll join us on the journey as we make our way through this great work of our Christian inheritance and Catholic culture.

Notes

Translation courtesy of Catholic University of America Press: https://verbum.com/product/120407/saint-augustine-christian-instruction-admonition-and-grace-the-christian-combat-faith-hope-and-charity

Alternate Translation at CatholicCulture.org: https://www.catholicculture.org/culture/library/fathers/view.cfm?recnum=3275

Go to http://www.catholicculture.org/getaudio to register for FREE access to the full archive of audiobooks beyond the most recent 15 episodes.

Theme music: 2 Part Invention, composed by Mark Christopher Brandt, performed by Thomas Mirus. ©️2019 Heart of the Lion Publishing Co./BMI. All rights reserved.