“How Augustine Explains to Porphyry, the ‘Bitterest Enemy of the Christian Faith’, the Resurrection and the Correct Balance between Flesh and Spirit, Body and Soul in City of God XXII”

While composing The City of God (Civ.) book XXII, Augustine evidently had 1Cor. 15:14 in mind (“ And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain, your faith also is in vain.” [ESV]). In chapters 25-28 of this book he responds to the Neoplatonist Porphyry, who denied Christ’s resurrection and criticized the Christian notion of the resurrection of the body. Augustine dismantled Porphyry’s criticism by confronting the dichotomies of flesh-spirit and body-soul. Of interest here is Augustine’s surprising claim that Porphyry’s thought on the relationship between the soul and body contradict that of his teacher, Plato. “A number of our people have a great affection for Plato because of his unique charm of style, and because of a number of points on which he had a true insight; and for that reason they say that his view about the resurrection of the dead was something like ours.” (XXII.28). In this final book of Civ., Augustine proves the plausibility of the resurrection of the flesh from a philosophical basis, as such, making a contribution to Greek philosophy and showing that Christianity is the actualization of the Platonist tradition.

This article will explore Augustine’s conception of the resurrection as seen through his refutation of his prime antagonist, Porphyry. Yet in order to do this, we must first establish what Porphyry meant to Augustine: how Porphyry’s claims, discussed in Civ. X, are related to his critique of the Christian notion of the resurrection of the flesh (in XXII) and to the general aims of the whole work.