Salvation and Sin: Augustine, Langland, and Fourteenth-Century Theology (review)

In Salvation and Sin: Augustine, Langland, and Fourteenth-Century Theology, David Aers insightfully explores the relationship between divine and human agency, especially as this relationship is affected by sin and manifested in the process of conversion. As Aers brings together diverse theologians—living in and before the fourteenth century, writing in Latin and the vernacular, in prose and in poetry—he demonstrates the breadth of ideas related to salvation in the fourteenth century and the need for scholars to engage with these authors' texts more widely. The book, which Aers describes as being written "from both an English department and a divinity school," is more theological in nature than most literary scholarship (xiii). Yet Aers's expertise in Middle English literature makes an uncommon contribution to theological study as well, as he insists upon and amply demonstrates the relevance of William Langland and Julian of Norwich to discussions of fourteenth-century theology.

One of Aers's primary concerns is to show the limitations of the labels scholars frequently use to describe salvation theologies: "Pelagian" or "semi-Pelagian" for those that emphasize human agency and "Augustinian" for those that emphasize God's agency. Instead of relying upon such categories, Aers invites scholars to go back to original sources to understand the theological nuances of figures like William of Ockham and Thomas Bradwardine, their relation to earlier theologians like Augustine and Aquinas, and their influence on later vernacular writers. Aers applies this model of scholarship to debates about the salvation theology of Piers Plowman, persuasively arguing against the predominant view that Langland espoused a "semi-Pelagian" understanding of salvation while demonstrating the centrality of Christ and the Redemption to Langland's theology.

The book begins with an "Augustinian Prelude" in which Aers explores Augustine's writings on conversion, inquiring from what Christians are converted (the earthly city), to what they are converted (the city of God), and most centrally, how a person can be converted from one to the other. While he discusses City of God and the Confessions most frequently, he also explores relevant writings against the Donatists and against the Pelagians and a number of sermons. In addition to going beyond the corpus of Augustine's texts with which literary scholars typically engage, Aers participates in current theological discussions of the meaning of Augustine's writings. Chief among his concerns is to demonstrate that Augustine did not envision conversion as an internal, autonomous act, as the philosopher Charles Taylor has argued (Sources of the Self: The Making of Modern Identity [Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989]). Instead, Aers shows the importance of community to conversion, both the community of the church, which mediates divine gifts, and the cooperative relationship with God that characterizes human acts of will. With reference to Augustine's exegesis of scriptural events like Paul's conversion and Peter's denial of Christ, Aers outlines an Augustinian model of conversion in which Christ's agency is "prevenient and intrinsic" in human agency (18).

Chapter 2, "Illustrating 'Modern Theology'," concentrates on Ockham's theology of salvation, often in conversation with Aquinas's writings on similar questions related to merit, grace, and the consequences of sin. Aers begins by outlining Ockham's pactum model, according to which God freely enters an agreement to save those who repent for and refrain from sin by their own natural powers. He then explains how the distinction Ockham draws between God's ordained and absolute power (potentia ordinata and potentia absoluta) preserves God's ultimate freedom, even if God agrees to save those humans who do well out of their own power. Aers finds this account of salvation insufficient insofar as it does not address the effects of sin on humans' ability to prevent themselves from sinning further. Equally important to Aers is how Ockham regards the central precepts of Christianity as arbitrary values that God could theoretically change. In other words, Aers protests that Ockham's theology is not [End...