The City of God

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The City of God, opening text, created c. 1470

The City of God (Latin: De Civitate Dei, also known as De Civitate Dei contra Paganos: The City of God against the Pagans) is a book written in Latin by Augustine of Hippo in the early 5th century, dealing with issues concerning God, martyrdom, Jews, and other Christian philosophies.

Augustine wrote the treatise to explain Christianity's relationship with competing religions and philosophies, and to the Roman government with which it was increasingly intertwined. It was written soon after Rome was sacked by the Visigoths in 410. This event left Romans in a deep state of shock, and many saw it as punishment for abandoning their pagan religion. It was in this atmosphere that Augustine set out to provide a consolation of Christianity, writing that it was the City of God that would ultimately triumph — symbolically, Augustine's eyes were fixed on heaven, a theme repeated in many Late Antiquity Christian art forms.

Despite Christianity's designation as the official religion of the empire, Augustine declared its message to be spiritual rather than political. Christianity, he argued, should be concerned with the mystical, heavenly City of Jerusalem (the New Jerusalem) rather than with Earthly politics. His theology supported and even helped to define the separation of Church and State that characterized part of the Western European politics through the Middle Ages and beyond. One notable exception were the Papal States in Italy, today downsized to the State of Vatican, ruled directly by the Roman Catholic Church. Moreover, throughout the Middle Ages the Pope claimed the right to depose the Catholic kings of Western Europe and exercised it, such as was the case with Henry VIII of England.

The book presents human history as being a conflict between what Augustine calls the City of Man and the City of God (a conflict that is destined to end in victory of the latter). The City of God is marked by people who forgo earthly pleasure and dedicate themselves to the promotion of Christian values. The City of Man, on the other hand, consists of people who have strayed from the City of God. The two cities are not meant to represent any actual places or organizations, though Augustine clearly thought that the Christian Church was at the heart of the City of God.

While the book is framed by discussion of these themes, it is largely made up of various digressions on philosophical subjects and presentations of flaws in pagan religions upon which Augustine wished to comment.

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