Augustine: On Free Choice of the Will

Rating:
Summary: Excellent
Review: Excellent work on the "problem of evil" in religion. For serious intellectual contemplaters only. Whether you ultimately agree or disagree with Augustine's premise, you will certainly appreciate the depth in which he addresses an issue that the world's most prolific religions readily ignore. If God is all good and God is the creator, why is there bad?

Rating:
Summary: Hard to read but .....
Review: I found the style and content interesting from the point of view that it gives the reader a glimpse into the minds of the church thinkers of the time. The arguments are made by someone who knows what they are supposed to believe and the work ignors some seemingly logical conclusions along the way. The primary purpose seems no to be directed at convincing unbelievers but to enforce the church's position. Many obvious, to a well educated populace, quiestions and opposing arguments are not addressed. To get the full impact of the reasoning we must take the work in context. We must imagine that we only knows what the average person knew at the time. Most education of the time was done by the church and the logic is constructed to convince those who believe in the infalability of the church and fear the consequences of opposing church thinkers. Take the time and energy to read this and you will see the logic parralells much of modern religious writings.

Rating:
Summary: An Interesting Start
Review: This is one of Augustine's early writings, from soon after his conversion. It records a conversation between himself and Evodius regarding free will. ... Augustine had very little access to Plato, and at this point in his life, probably nothing not quoted by another source. The dialogue is in fact based upon a real conversation, and not just a literary creation (a result of the philosophical community that Augustine lived in for some time after his conversion). However, Augustine edited it and added material (most of Bk. III) before publishing it.

The main things I thought a reader ought to note when reading this short work are (1) This is still the beginning of work on the will - it was not a major issue in philosophy until Augustine, although bits and pieces may be found, e.g. in Cicero; (2) Augustine's style is quite different from what most people are used to, especially since this is a record of an actual conversation; (3) the problem of evil for Augustine is of a different nature then that promulgated in modern times; (4) the only two people who had a paradigmatically free will were Adam and Eve - everyone else has a less than free will and requires God's grace to will effectively, even when they wish to do good.

It is an interesting work but still represents the early thought of Augustine. Those without a Neoplatonic background will find some of its arguments strange. There is no good introduction to Augustine - in my experience, you have to read a great deal of him in order to understand the typical way he thinks and the concepts he relies upon implicitly. Some Plotinus is probably useful.