Early Church · 397

On Christian Doctrine

Augustine of Hippo (354-430)

A manual for reading Scripture and teaching it to others, this work gave the Western church its first systematic account of Christian hermeneutics and preaching. Augustine addresses how to distinguish signs from the things they signify, how to handle ambiguous or obscure passages, and how to shape instruction for different audiences, weaving Ciceronian rhetoric into a thoroughly theological framework. Begun around 397 when he was bishop of Hippo and completed nearly thirty years later, it shaped the preaching tradition from the Carolingian scholars through the Reformers.

5.5 hrs total · 150 chapters