Abstract

In the fourth century, ecclesiastical writers increasingly showed keen interest in understanding the nature of cosmos and its relationship to the creator. Foremost, perhaps, among these was Augustine. His works dealing with Genesis 1-3 are prolific. Questions about the cosmos were crucial to him. The creation story was both alluring and important to Augustine and its appeal lasted throughout his life. ;This study investigates the relationship between Augustine's speculative cosmology found in his De Genesi ad Litteram and the cosmological notions in his sermons. It compares the intellectual worlds of the elite and the populace. The investigation first examines role of cosmology in fourth-century culture. Next it explicates the cosmology that Augustine crafted in this commentary. It then explores the relationship between preacher and audience. It next demonstrates that Augustine's teaching on cosmology to his congregations was sophisticated and substantial and assesses the cosmologies represented among his audience. ;The work argues that Augustine developed a sophisticated cosmology which was crucial to his own intellectual development and that his sermons both popularize the ideas that came to fruition in De Genesi ad Litteram and respond to popular, contradictory cosmologies. This study demonstrates: the significance of cosmology in late antique thought and society; the developing role of the doctrine of creatio ex nihilo; the elaboration of cosmology in this work of Augustine's mature years; the decisive break between Augustine's understanding and the Neoplatonism which had earlier influenced him; the place of contemplation and the end he hoped to achieve by contemplating the cosmos; the role of pedagogy in the church and its contrast with that available to ordinary pagans; the sophistication and dynamism of Augustine's congregations; Augustine's attempts to influence the thought and discourse of his society on these matters; the increasing role that the doctrine creatio ex nihilo exercised in the Church and Late Antiquity; the significant contribution Augustine made in the process of demystifying nature and placing it on a rational structure; and the conflicts this emerging doctrine had with alternative systems