Augustine’s Philosophical Anthropology: Immortality of Human Soul in a Composite Soul-Body

In The City of God, Saint Augustine presents Varro as a representative of his dualistic anthropology, which consists of two substances. He defines a whole man as one who is composed of both body and soul. An individual human person is an essential body and soul composite. The soul apart from the body and vice versa cannot be recognized as the whole man. The man has to have both the degenerative material body and the immortal soul together as a unit. [1] My goal in this paper is to show how Augustine used the Platonic tradition as his philosophical framework to harmonize and shape the Christian philosophical anthropology that is compatible with the teachings of the Christian Scriptures.

His works on philosophical anthropology show that he was under the strong influence of Platonism and the Neoplatonist works of Plotinus and Porphyry. Frederick C. Copleston claims that Augustine used many of the Neoplatonic ideas while formulating the Christian world and life view. [2] Although he had been a Platonist before his conversion to Christianity, his view on the soul seeks to reinterpret the Platonic and Neoplatonic view of the immortality of the soul. [3] For Augustine, the souls are created, but immaterial substances simultaneously bear the image of God.

Firstly, Platonism claims the souls to be eternally existing and self-sustaining substances that are not created, contrary to what Augustine believes. Diogenes Allen, the professor of philosophy, writes that “the care of the soul was the fundamental concern for Socrates, Plato, and Plotinus; they all believed that the soul is immortal and is capable of existing without a body.” [4] For Plato, the soul represents the true essence of a person, possessing attributes such as the inherent potential for independent existence and the ability to function fully apart from the body. It escapes from death; hence, it also avoids the obliteration of the material body, which is merely “the prison house of the soul.” The soul is the principle of life that embodies the essential qualities of the body. Therefore, the soul is the life force for the body.

Secondly, the body is a matter that is also competent to exist on its own, but the functionality comes to a halt by virtue of being inert after death, which is followed by decomposition. Socrates thinks this is how “death separates the soul from the body.” If there is such a thing called death, then it is merely the separation of the soul from the body. [5] Therefore, it is safe to say that the death of a person does not mean an end of personal existence. According to the Platonic view, death only provides a means for the soul to escape and be liberated from the impure and polluted body. For that reason, the body serves as a prison for the soul to inhabit for a limited time and space, but it does not constitute a real person.

Finally, Plato believes that the human soul is rational and a real person. The real knowledge of the Form is only possible if the soul is pure and immortal. “Pythagoras himself apparently thinks that what makes the soul divine is the intellect, the power to know true, unchanging reality,” says Allen. “This is the order, proportion, and harmony in the universe evident to reason and the senses.” [6] Socrates called the soul the “source of motion” and “the intelligence or mind of a person.” [7] In this sense, the soul or the intelligence or mind of a person must pre-exist bodily existence. Through the virtue of the soul, real knowledge should be recognized independently; it cannot be otherwise. [8] Thus, the soul must have ontologically existed from eternity by means of its eternal characteristics; hence, it has borne the basic ideas or knowledge.

Unlike Platonism, the anthropology of Neoplatonism does not consider the soul as the principle of life. “Soul is related to Intellect analogously to the way Intellect is related to the One. As the One is virtually what Intellect is, so Intellect is paradigmatically what Soul is.” [9] Having said this, the soul transcends everything except the One, because everything emanates from the One. Therefore, the human is more like God.

Nevertheless, Plotinus views the totality of a human person as only the reflection of the temporal embodied life of the soul, and the soul uses the body as the instrument to individualize itself. The distinction between an individual and the soul-body composite is quite plainly explained in terms of the individual human likeness with “a cognitive agent or subject of cognitive states.” [10] Therefore, the soul is a rational being or a true self in a material body.

By the time of Augustine, the philosophical problem of the relationship between the body and soul was still continuing in the marketplace of philosophy schools. He obviously acknowledges the fact that man is the apex of creation and is created with the soul and the body. Nevertheless, he makes a distinction between the two as soul-body unity. Copleston presents Augustine’s position on the soul-body, as he views “a soul as a possession of a body; it does not constitute two persons but one man.” [11] The body and the soul should be accounted for in relation to each other, because the soul, as he perceives it, ought to be identified with the body too. The soul alone cannot be counted as a whole person or otherwise.

Augustine argues for the soul’s immortality first through the human mind and second through the Christian God’s teachings. Augustine argues that the soul must be a reality because of its capacity to reason. O’Connor summarizes Augustine’s argument as follows: “Truth so exists in the soul that it is inseparable from it, but Truth is immortal; therefore, the soul is immortal.” [12] He applies the Truth to the soul and argues back to the truth again to imply the unbreakable correlation between the two.

In other words, the soul is a rational being actualizing its essence into the material and corporeal body in order to be a fully human being. “Since the truth can only exist in an incorporeal substance that is alive and is inseparably connected with it as with its subject, this incorporeal substance, i.e., the soul, must everlastingly live.” [13] In view of the fact that only living substances can reason and the soul is living. Therefore, the soul must necessarily be an incorporeal substance to reason. Thus, the soul is immortal.

The human soul, once identified as incorporeal, is now a living substance that serves as the axiom animating the body. The living soul directs and guides the body. Augustine insists that if the truth is to be immortal, then he reasons, unquestionably on a Platonic basis, that the human soul must be immortal, since the truth can only exist in the incorporeal soul. [14] In this very sense, the soul is superior and manipulates the body for sensory experiences, not vice versa. “Consequently, if, as we said above, the soul is a subject in which reason is inseparably (by that necessity also by which it is shown to be in the subject), neither can there be any soul except a living soul, nor can reason be in a soul without life, and reason is immortal; hence, the soul is immortal.” [15] By applying the same logic that the reason resides in the mind, Augustine analyzes why the soul is immortal.

Augustine’s first reason for the soul’s immortality is science’s eternal nature. According to his writing, science exists everywhere and can never cease to exist in the human mind. It is eternal, and its nature and truth cannot be invalidated. The reason is that the equilateral triangle always has three equal angles and three equal sides. The form of the equilateral triangle exists in our human mind without seeing it once we know its basic characteristics. It is rooted in absolute truth and science.

He further maintains that science needs lives for its own existence. Science is possessed only by the living, so it dwells only in things that can reason. If we are beings capable of reasoning, meaning our minds are active, and if our minds require science to reason correctly, and if no mind can exist without science except as an unscientific mind, then science resides within the human mind. [16] Obviously, the point here is, if science is unchangeable, surely the unchangeable must also be the same eternal property that holds another eternal property. By applying the same logic, we can say that the mind in which eternal science exists ought to be eternal in terms of its nature, and that eternal cannot exist in non-eternal.

Likewise, reason comes from the mind. In the process of reasoning, the soul performs solely, devoid of any assistance from the body.  Our thought or reason comes to exist independently through thinking. As Augustine contends that science is the synonym for all knowledge of any type and kind, it exists and dwells in the human mind. [17] Anything that comes into existence independently through our thoughts is therefore eternal. Therefore, the human mind is eternal, and it always lives. O’Connor puts the argument very succinctly:

The human soul contains knowledge, but all knowledge pertains to some science, and science is immortal; therefore, the soul is immortal. Another argument followed, which also appealed to Augustine’s mind when it was made. The soul of man is immortal because it is the seat of Reason which is immortal. Reason is another of those things that exists in the soul in an inseparable manner, but Reason can exist only in a living subject, and since it must exist always, its subject must be immortal; therefore, the human soul is immortal. [18]

The second reason for the immortality of the soul is Reason itself, which is immutable. Our reason originates in the mind. Now, it is lawful to say that Reason is in the mind or reason itself is a mind, giving the qualifications of the soul as inseparable from the Reason. We have already talked about Reason that it is also, in the same manner as science and mind, necessarily inseparable from the subject (referring to the body), since the Reason needs the living subject according to its nature to function as a complete unit.

The body is mutable due to the alteration in its mode of existence. On the other hand, Reason is immutable and undeniable in the sense that it applies the same mode consistently in its reasoning. [19] Nothing can influence the mode. Two plus two always equals four, and their existing mode does not change at all. The mode of these numerical values does not change but always exists in the same mode. Therefore, the Reason then is immutable.

Augustine writes that the soul is immortal because God created it and intended it to be immortal. It bears the very image of God. As a result, the soul is superior to the body, says Cooper. Furthermore, he argues that God created the soul as a “simple spiritual substance” that does not decompose. [20] This truth is obvious: whatever does not decompose lives. The soul escapes bodily death because God bestowed immortality when he created it in his image.

Augustine knows the Platonic ideas of reincarnation of the soul. In the City of God, he states that “Plato said that souls could not exist eternally without bodies; for it was on this account, he said, that the souls even of wise men must some time or other return to their bodies.” [21] For Plato, the eternal soul does return to live in another body and become a reincarnated being. That kind of soul shall return to the Father after death of the body. In their reincarnated state, they will escape the misery of the ill world and suffer no more.

After assessing Plato and Porphyry’s views, we see they differ from the Christian view of the resurrection of the body and soul. The opposing views both deny the bodily resurrection. Porphyry says that the pure soul belongs to the wise and righteous and should only return to the incorruptible bodies in the world to live a blessed and immortal life. [22] He knows that the cycle of this life, reincarnation, should come to an end for the deliverance of these righteous souls, but he thinks that no philosophical school of thought has discovered it yet.

By combining these two perspectives, we can identify the missing link that Augustine discovered, which helps to formulate a Christian understanding of eternal life for the soul and body in harmony with Scripture. The missing link is the grace of Christ, which Porphyry overlooked because he incorrectly sought a universal method for the deliverance of the soul. [23] He writes:

We (Christians) say that the separation of the soul from the body is to be held as part of man’s punishment. For they (concerning other philosophers) suppose that the blessedness of the soul is complete only when it is quite denuded of the body and returns to God as a pure and simple and, as it were, naked soul.” [24]

Augustine rejects this argument because its logic is inconsistent and contradicts the doctrine of reincarnation.

If we combine the views of Plato and Porphyry, we find that they closely resemble the Christian doctrine of the resurrection of the saints in the end days. Porphyry believes that the holy or purified soul will never return to live in misery. Then, let Porphyry agree with Plato that they will return to their bodies, and let Plato agree with Porphyry that they will not return to their previous agony. [25] These views from Plato and Porphyry echo Christian thought, as Augustine himself had suspected them of being Christian. [26]

After examining Augustine’s position on the immortality of the soul and the soul-body composite as a union, we can easily assume how much Greek philosophy and individual philosophers had influenced his thought. We can trace the influence of Platonic traditions and Neo-Platonic thought in his writing, as he occasionally expresses and deliberates these ideas in his works. Neoplatonism greatly influenced his philosophical theology of original sin, free will, and the nature of the human soul. For example, Augustine praises Porphyry for substituting Plato’s view that the human soul will not return to beasts rather than human bodies.

In the history of Christianity, the Neo-Platonic influence did not always prove to be a disadvantage. Augustine used much of their material to shape Christian philosophical thought without losing the originality of the orthodox theology of the Church Fathers who lived before him.

In addition to his contribution to the early church, Augustine’s philosophical theology played a major role in the development of the Reformation theology. Thomas Aquinas’s works reflect Augustine’s philosophical theology. Later, Reformers like Luther and especially John Calvin were much influenced. The theology of Total Depravity and the Irresistible Grace of Augustine had a profound impact on Calvin.

Thus, Augustine’s philosophical theology, and especially the Christian philosophical anthropology, has had a significant impact throughout church history. Apostle Paul’s teaching was the guidance for Augustine to keep the orthodox theology of the Church from the syncretism and philosophical pluralism of the time. Through his anthropological philosophy, we can now understand what makes us a complete human person and the implication of our soul living in eternity with God.

Works Cited

Allen, Diogenes. Philosophy for Understanding Theology. Atlanta, Ga.: John Knox, 1985. Print.

Augustine. Basic Writings of Saint Augustine: On the Immortality of the Soul. Trans. Whitney Jennings Oates. Vol. 1. New York: Random House, 1948. Print.

Augustine. The City of God. Trans. Marcus Dods. New York: Barnes & Noble, 2006. Print.

Augustine. “The Immortality of the Soul.” Trans. Ludwig Schopp. The Fathers of the Church: A New Translation. Vol. 4. [New York]: Catholic University of America, 1947. 10-15. Print.

Cahn, Steven M. “Plato.” Classics of Western Philosophy. 7th ed. Indianapolis, IN: Hackett Pub., 2006. 49-113. Print.

Cooper, John W. Body, Soul, and Life Everlasting: Biblical Anthropology and the Monism-Dualism Debate. 2nd ed. Grand Rapids, Mich.: Eerdmans, 1989. Print.

O’Connor, William P. The Concept of the Human Soul According to Saint Augustine. Thesis. Catholic University of America, 1921. Milwaukee: Archdiocese of Milwaukee, 1921. Print.

“Plotinus.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. Web. 19 Apr. 2010.<http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plotinus/>.

Print.

“Plotinus.” Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy. 30 June 2003. Metaphysics Research Lab, CSLI, Stanford University. 26 Apr. 2010 <http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/plotinus/>.

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