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6 Case Study: Death and Resurrection If you are dreading death, love the resurrection.1 Augustine’s preaching does not merely make frequent reference to death and resurrection: it is saturated with a thorough-going emphasis upon the end of mortal life. A case study upon this theme of death and resurrection permits us to examine how Augustine appealed to interiority and temporality when applying Scripture to this important concern. It is our intention in this chapter to expose the methods Augustine used in a way which demonstrates empathy for his approach. Just as we have selected the topic of death and resurrection because it is so prevalent in his preaching, so the aspects of that preaching which we will consider aim to be representative of Augustine’s practices. Our intention is that the form of exploration be shaped by the content. In that sense, our study will be appropriately inductive. Jesus’ Death The death of Jesus was the means by which God overcame death. Augustine was concerned to proclaim the full reality of what happened on the cross: “God died, that he might make compensation in a certain kind of divine exchange, that humanity might not see death. So Christ is God, but he did not die in the aspect by which he was God.”2 Not shying away from the bold claim that God died on the cross, Augustine is careful to explain in what sense this ought to be understood. In the incarnation, “he put on what he was not, he did not lose what he was.”3 The humanity which he assumed enabled God to experience death through the person of Jesus. Augustine was clearly determined to preach 1. “Si expauescis mortem, ama resurrectionem.” s. 124.4 (PL 38, 688). 2. “Mortuus est deus, ut compensatio fieret caelestis cuiusdam mercimonii, ne mortem uideret homo. Deus enim Christus, sed non ibi mortuus ubi deus.” s. 80.5 (PL 38, 496). 3. “Assumpsit enim quod non erat, non amisit quod erat.” s. 80.5 (PL 38, 496). 121 that God died, and when he did so, he wished to explain in what sense the immortal God could die. Augustine agonized over the conundrum: how could he who cannot suffer or die be killed?4 Defense of orthodoxy, however, was only part of the preacher’s interest; Augustine desired to present the death of Jesus in such a way that the implications for listeners were made clear. The crucial point he highlighted, then, was that the death of Jesus was the means of killing death itself, saying, “The immortal one put on mortality, that he might die for us, and by his death kill our death.”5 With the aim of persuasion and exhortation, Augustine followed such presentations of the death of Jesus with invitations to confession: “First confess, that you may prepare a dwelling place for him whom you are calling upon.”6 Such language echoes that of Confessiones: “I will always confess to him . . . who lives in us.”7 In this way, we see that Augustine’s preaching of the death of Jesus aimed to provoke a reaction in a manner which complements the responsive nature of Confessiones. Consistent with our study, it is Scripture which shapes the way Augustine presents Christ’s death. The death of Christ is situated in the temporal narrative of Scripture; two examples of this may be considered. First, the figure of Elisha is said to enact prophetically Jesus’ overcoming of death.8 Augustine suggests that the way Elisha conformed his body to the shape of the dead boy’s form was a prophecy of Jesus conforming himself to mortals through the incarnation. Second, he preached about Moses’ rod which was turned into a snake, arguing that the snake represents mortality, since in Eden it was the snake who offered death to Eve.9 By ascribing to the snake these various significations, Augustine establishes his proclamation of Jesus’s death within the temporal narrative of scripture: “He was robed in mortality, which he also fixed to the cross.”10 Thus, the putting on of mortality is not simply a philosophical notion or an atemporal concept; the scriptural setting gives it a temporal signification. Similar links are made elsewhere when Augustine notes that as a woman seduced Adam into death, so 4. s. 375B.4 (MA 1, 25). 5. “Immortalis suscepit mortalitatem, ut moreretur pro nobis, et morte sua occideret mortem nostram.” s. 23A.3 (CCL 41, 322). 6. “Primo confitere, ut pares...

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