Feminist Interpretatons of Augustine

by Stark, Judith Chelius

• ISBN13: 9780271032580
• ISBN10: 0271032588
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2007-01-01
• Publisher: Pennsylvania State Univ Pr

Summary

Since the establishment of Christianity in the West as a major religious tradition, Augustine (354-430 C.E.) has been considered a principal architect of the ways philosophy can be used for reasoning about faith. In particular, Augustine effected the joining of Platonism with Christian belief for the Middle Ages and beyond. The results of his enterprise continue to be felt, especially with regard to the contested topics of human embodiment, sexuality, and the nature and roles of women. As a result, few thinkers have been as problematic for feminists as he has been. He is the thinker that a number of feminists love to hate. What do feminist thinkers make of this problematic legacy? These lively essays address that question and provide thoughtful arguments for the value of engaging Augustine's ideas and texts anew by using the well-established methodologies that feminists have developed over the last thirty years. Augustine and his legacy have much to answer for, but these essays show that the body of his work also has much to offer as feminists explore, challenge, and reframe his thinking while forging new paradigms for construing gender, power, and notions of divinity.

Table of Contents

Preface	p. vii
Introduction	p. 1
Augustine: Sexuality, Gender, and Women	p. 47
Monica: The Feminine Face of Christ	p. 69
Augustine's Rhetoric of the Feminine in the Confessions: Woman as Mother, Woman as Other	p. 97
Confessing Monica	p. 119
O Mother, Where Art Thou? In Search of Saint Monnica	p. 147
Not Nameless but Unnamed: The Woman Torn from Augustine's Side	p. 167
Augustine's Letters to Women	p. 189
De cura feminarum: Augustine the Bishop, North African Women, and the Development of a Theology of Female Nature	p. 203
Augustine on Women: In God's Image, but Less So	p. 215
To Remember Self, to Remember God: Augustine on Sexuality, Relationality, and the Trinity	p. 243
The Evanescence of Masculinity: Deferral in Saint Augustine's Confessions and Some Thoughts on Its Bearing on the Sex/Gender Debate	p. 281
Poem: To Aurelius Augustine from the Mother of His Son	p. 301
Select Bibliography	p. 303
Contributors	p. 313
Index	p. 317
Table of Contents provided by Ingram. All Rights Reserved.