Book Review: Augustine, Sermons 1-19

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Charles Johnson

Puritan Board Junior
Disclaimer: I read these in PL 38, not any print edition.
These sermons handled short passages from the old testament, including the temptation of Abraham, and various verses from the Psalms. In dealing with the temptation of Abraham, Augustine sees a type or shadow of Christ and the New Testament under everything that is present or that takes place. He is much more indulgent and allegorical as an interpreter than is popular today. Isaac is Christ; Christ carried his cross, and Isaac carried his wood. The ram is Christ; its horns were caught in the thorns, and Christ was given a crown of thorns upon his head. Etc. Perhaps we are to slow to see types and figures and the Old Testament, and he was too quick. Many of his interpretations are plausible though, and this book is an interesting window into the preaching of the western church's greatest theologian. Of all possible ways to preach on the Old Testament, surely Augustine's is far from the worst, insofar as he understands all of the bible to concern Christ.
In general, Augustine's sermons are moral in nature, and he exhorts his listeners to greater virtue through an exposition of the text. There is comparatively little of "gospel preaching" in them. But again, in our day we have perhaps gone to an opposite extreme, and sermons among many Reformed folks have very little exposition of the law or exhortation to godliness.
Augustine's sermons have perhaps justifiably received less attention than his doctrinal treatises or his longer works, but I am comfortable saying that every Christian should read at least a few of the sermons of this great doctor.
 
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