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Rhetoric and Scripture in Augustine’s Homiletic Strategy: Tracing the Narrative of Christian Maturation
Michael Glowasky
Brill (2020). 195 pp.
Part of what makes Augustine such an extraordinary Christian thinker is his ability to synthesize the manifold truths of Scripture and the complex intellectual world of Late Antiquity into something both simple enough to be preached to the faithful saints in his backwater parish of Hippo Regius and yet also deep enough to be studied by theologians, philosophers, and classicists for one and a half millennia. It is that movement, the movement from complexity to simplicity, all for the sake of pastoral ministry, that makes Augustine an enduring figure and a model for the Pastor Theologian. Michael Glowasky’s fascinating study Rhetoric and Scripture in Augustine’s Homiletic Strategy shows us how we see these dynamics displayed in Augustine’s work as a preacher and a catechist.
In the book, Glowasky examines the interplay between Augustine’s use of the conventions of classical rhetoric on the one hand and the various occasions of his preaching ministry on the other hand in order to illuminate how Augustine tailored his homiletic speech to the needs of those who sat under his teaching. Before becoming a pastor, Augustine had made a name for himself through his rhetorical giftedness; he was a teacher of rhetoric, rising to the position of professor of rhetoric in the city of Milan. As a trained rhetor, Augustine “learned that it was of the utmost importance not to speak haphazardly, but instead to be strategic, and to carefully select and pronounce each syllable based on a central persuasive goal” (p. 1). Glowasky argues that Augustine the pastor did not dispense with his rhetorical training but instead converted these tools to the ends of proclamation and catechesis.
Glowasky argues that, as a student of the ancient rhetors Cicero and Quintilian, Augustine’s preaching adopts the classical speech-type of narratio for his sermons. But Augustine does not merely adopt narratio; he also adapts it to the needs of his hearers. The study examines how he adapts, looking at Augustine’s preaching to those in the catechetical process (rudes, catechumens, and competentes), to newly baptized Christians (neophytes), and to the faithful pilgrims who are still on their way to the New Jerusalem (i.e., ordinary church-going Christians). In separate chapters Glowasky identifies how in each instance Augustine utilizes specific rhetorical strate gies for the distinct pastoral needs of those whom he is addressing.
By identifying this synthesis of rhetorical technique and pastoral need, Glowasky illuminates the underlying movements in Augustine’s preaching. Take, for example, Glowasky’s third chapter on Augustine’s preaching to catechumens. When the significance of narratio is established for Augustine’s catechetical guidebook Instructing Beginners in the Faith, it is much easier to discern the exact goal of the catechetical address given to the rudes (individuals considering becoming catechumens): to demonstrate the character of the Church as the place where salvation is found. In Augustine’s ministry the catechetical address is not a general appeal to consider the claims of Christianity; instead, Augustine teaches with the specific goal of persuading men and women to trust that the Church is where they will find the message of salvation. “The implication throughout is that the Catholic Church is the subject of the divine narratio and thus the true locus of salvation in the present age” (p. 73).
Glowasky also shows how Augustine adapts his exegesis of specific passages to the pastoral needs of his audience. In each chapter Glowasky considers Augustine’s preaching on the same passages but delivered to people who are in different steps of the process of Christian maturation. Augustine’s preaching on creation in Gen 1, on the flood, and on the exodus is considered, and Glowasky notes how Augustine emphasizes different aspects of each narrative to care for the needs of catechumens, recent converts, and the faithful respectively. The result is not only an analysis of Augustine’s use of rhetoric or a description of Augustine’s exegetical imagination; we also see Augustine’s pastoral theology and his understanding of how sanctification unfolds progressively in the lives of men and women. As Glowasky notes in his conclusion: “Augustine’s preaching is, above all, shaped by his conviction that the Christian life is a journey to the vision of God” (p. 159).
Augustine continues to be an important model for the Pastor Theologian, and the best scholarship on the North African Church Father illuminates how he made use of the varied resources that his immense intellect had at its disposal and which he put to use for the sake of the care and cure of souls. Glowasky’s book does this well, drawing our attention to Augustine’s training in rhetoric along the way to demonstrating the deeper logic of his preaching and teaching. While the book is aimed at Augustine specialists and the current price makes the volume more likely to be checked out of the library than purchased by the average pastor, it can be read to great profit by the aspiring Pastor Theologian as an example to emulate in one’s own practice of preaching and catechesis.
Joey Sherrard (PhD, St. Andrews University) is Associate Pastor of Discipleship of Signal Mountain Presbyterian Church in Signal Mountain, TN. He is a member of the St. Anselm Fellowship of the Center for Pastor Theologians.
