Augustine's City of God

James Wetzel is Professor of Philosophy at Villanova University and the first permanent holder of the Augustinian Endowed Chair in the Thought of Saint Augustine. He is the author of Augustine and the Limits of Virtue (Cambridge University Press, 1992) and Augustine: A Guide for the Perplexed (2010).

'To guide readers into the bishop's magnum opus, this collection of twelve essays, one of fifteen titles in the Cambridge Critical Guide series focusing on philosophical authors, draws upon specialists from the fields of theology, philosophy, and classics … a helpful resource for suitably equipped readers critically examining De civitate Dei … The contributions are diverse enough that few are likely to agree with every argument, but those arguments are generally well presented and the collection will stimulate discussion … academics in any pertinent field leading honours/upper-division students through De civ. would be hard pressed not to find several essays here suitable for assigning as supplemental reading …' David Neal Greenwood, Bryn Mawr Classical Review

• Introduction James Wetzel; 1. The history of the book: Augustine's City of God and post-Roman cultural memory Mark Vessey; 2. Secularity and the saeculum Paul J. Griffiths; 3. Augustine's dystopia Peter Iver Kaufman; 4. From rape to resurrection: sin, sexual difference, and politics Margaret R. Miles; 5. Ideology and solidarity in Augustine's City of God John Cavadini; 6. The theatre of the virtues: Augustine's critique of Pagan mimesis Jennifer Herdt; 7. The psychology of compassion: Stoicism in City of God 9.5 Sarah Byers; 8. Augustine's rejection of eudaimonism Nicholas Wolterstorff; 9. Augustine on the origin of evil: myth and metaphysics James Wetzel; 10. Hell and the dilemmas of intractable alienation John Bowlin; 11. On the nature and worth of Christian philosophy: evidence from the City of God John Rist; 12. Reinventing Augustine's ethics: the afterlife of City of God Bonnie Kent.