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Predestination of the Saints
""Predestination of the Saints"" is a theological work written by Saint Augustine, a prominent Christian theologian and philosopher of the 4th and 5th centuries. The book explores the concept of predestination, which is the idea that God has already determined the fate of every individual before they are born. Augustine argues that predestination is a fundamental aspect of Christian doctrine and that it is necessary for understanding God's sovereignty and the nature of salvation. He also discusses the role of free will in relation to predestination and emphasizes the importance of living a virtuous life. Overall, ""Predestination of the Saints"" is a complex and thought-provoking work that delves into some of the most fundamental questions of Christian theology.THIS 34 PAGE ARTICLE WAS EXTRACTED FROM THE St. Augustin Anti-Pelagian Nicene and Post-Nicene Fathers of the Christian Church V5, by Saint Augustin . To purchase the entire book, please order ISBN 0766183955.This scarce antiquarian book is a facsimile reprint of the old original and may contain some imperfections such as library marks and notations. Because we believe this work is culturally important, we have made it available as part of our commitment for protecting, preserving, and promoting the world's literature in affordable, high quality, modern editions, that are true to their original work.
48 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 400
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About the author
Augustine of Hippo
3,272 books2,004 followersEarly church father and philosopher Saint Augustine served from 396 as the bishop of Hippo in present-day Algeria and through such writings as the autobiographical
Confessions
in 397 and the voluminous
City of God
from 413 to 426 profoundly influenced Christianity, argued against Manichaeism and Donatism, and helped to establish the doctrine of original sin.
An Augustinian follows the principles and doctrines of Saint Augustine.
People also know Aurelius Augustinus in English of Regius (Annaba). From the Africa province of the Roman Empire, people generally consider this Latin theologian of the greatest thinkers of all times. He very developed the west. According to Jerome, a contemporary, Augustine renewed "the ancient Faith."
The Neo-Platonism of Plotinus afterward heavily weighed his years. After conversion and his baptism in 387, Augustine developed his own approach to theology and accommodated a variety of methods and different perspectives. He believed in the indispensable grace to human freedom and framed the concept of just war. When the Western Roman Empire started to disintegrate from the material earth, Augustine developed the concept of the distinct Catholic spirituality in a book of the same name. He thought the medieval worldview. Augustine closely identified with the community that worshiped the Trinity. The Catholics and the Anglican communion revere this preeminent doctor. Many Protestants, especially Calvinists, consider his due teaching on salvation and divine grace of the theology of the Reformation. The Eastern Orthodox also consider him. He carries the additional title of blessed. The Orthodox call him "Blessed Augustine" or "Saint Augustine the Blessed."
Santo Agostinho
An Augustinian follows the principles and doctrines of Saint Augustine.
People also know Aurelius Augustinus in English of Regius (Annaba). From the Africa province of the Roman Empire, people generally consider this Latin theologian of the greatest thinkers of all times. He very developed the west. According to Jerome, a contemporary, Augustine renewed "the ancient Faith."
The Neo-Platonism of Plotinus afterward heavily weighed his years. After conversion and his baptism in 387, Augustine developed his own approach to theology and accommodated a variety of methods and different perspectives. He believed in the indispensable grace to human freedom and framed the concept of just war. When the Western Roman Empire started to disintegrate from the material earth, Augustine developed the concept of the distinct Catholic spirituality in a book of the same name. He thought the medieval worldview. Augustine closely identified with the community that worshiped the Trinity. The Catholics and the Anglican communion revere this preeminent doctor. Many Protestants, especially Calvinists, consider his due teaching on salvation and divine grace of the theology of the Reformation. The Eastern Orthodox also consider him. He carries the additional title of blessed. The Orthodox call him "Blessed Augustine" or "Saint Augustine the Blessed."
Santo Agostinho
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Displaying 1 - 15 of 15 reviews
February 26, 2025
Treats well of the topic of the primacy of grace in our love, which then preempts any of our works. The Saint so explains predestination in the light of Scripture to display that man's will is intact while God maintains sovereignty in all things. This short work makes sense of our will, perseverance, and the need to do good.
June 15, 2023
Clever but not fully convincing.
This is a great summary of Augustine's understanding of the doctrine of predestination but to me his reasoning is not fully convincing. I got a better understanding on what the appeal of this doctrine was for some of the Reformers and other Medieval theologians.
This is a great summary of Augustine's understanding of the doctrine of predestination but to me his reasoning is not fully convincing. I got a better understanding on what the appeal of this doctrine was for some of the Reformers and other Medieval theologians.
July 25, 2025
What can I say about this book? Despite being tedious and overwrought, Augustine's view can actually be summed up very briefly. I agree with Edward Gibbon in that I do not see the real distinction between Augustine's theology of the Elect and John Calvin's. Accordingly, this is an important book for Reformed doctrine. On its merits, however, I think it is vastly overrated.
Augustine's view evolves out of a few core assumptions. One is that God is righteous and cannot do any unrighteousness. Another is that we cannot understand the ways of God. One is the necessity of Grace in our salvation, which he felt had been threatened by the teachings of Pelagius (who apparently alleged that Grace is given to those who do good works or who prepare themselves for such grace). Another assumption of Augustine's is his own doctrine of Original Sin. An unstated assumption, as well, that is manifestly clear throughout, is that Augustine seems to think that if a human does the minimum of what he is asked to do, it is to that person's glory.
Augustine's view on the predestination of the saints is simply as follows: Due to Adam's sin, we are all born sinful and from the moment we are created, we are created deserving of death as well as eternal conscious torment. This is righteous and just because God cannot do anything unrighteous and just, and if this seems unjust, God's ways are mysterious and difficult to understand. However, because God is loving, God has chosen some people to call to salvation who, because they are called, are unable to refuse the call, while He also neglects to call some others who will be condemned to eternal conscious torment. The condemnation of these unlucky ones, despite having no less merits than those God chooses to save, should make those who are saved feel very thankful to God for His grace to them. Because Augustine asserts that God would be justified in creating an infinite number of souls (who he believes God knits together in the womb) in the corruption of Adam's sin without saving any and condemning all to eternal suffering in hell, it is therefore an unbelievable mercy that even a small number might be given grace and be saved while the rest are destroyed without salvation. It is his view that there is nothing we can do to merit, or choose to accept, this grace when it is bestowed upon us because God is the one who gives us faith and turns our spirit to accept this faith and essentially makes us live in accordance with the faith. Thus, when we do evil, it is merely because God is choosing not to work good in us so that we may be condemned to hell, that His grace to the saved may be manifest to them and they may be even more thankful.
Augustine asserts that it would be wrong to go through his predecessors to look for any that agree with these opinions, because he readily admits that you will find none who hold them. On this point he is correct. He claims, however, that this is because they did not have to deal with questions regarding election in a way that he does, and he assures us that if the ancient writers did have to do so, they would have come to the same conclusion. Here he is either ignorant or lying. It is simply a fact that the theology of Justin Martyr and Clement of Alexandria, to name just two, is explicitly opposed to Augustine's view. On the other hand, I can name a good number of figures who held to a similar view of election as Augustine. They are Valentinian, Marcion, Carpocrates, and the like: namely, almost all of the heretics. In his work "Against Heresies," Irenaeus weakly makes the argument that Herod was allowed to slaughter the infants of Bethlehem so that they would be glorified as the first Christian martyrs. According to Augustine, it would seem that, contrary to this opinion, they were slaughtered to burn in hell eternally so that we might glory more in the mercy that God has given us, and that if Ireneaus were just to think about it harder, he would come to agree with him. If he, and Justin Martyr, and Origen, and Clement of Alexandria, and Tertullian, and Cyprian did not then come to agree, perhaps he would have given them the advice he gives to those who disagree with him in "On Grace and Free Will," which is to simply pray to God that you might be capable of understanding him.
Fundamentally, Augustine's problem is that he cannot see any way that, after being given the gifts of the spirit by grace (such as faith, understanding, self-control, etc.) that we can freely choose to submit to God's will for us without giving us glory that is due to God alone. Therefore, it must all be God's doing and if God's design to not save some while saving others who have done nothing more to deserve salvation is confusing, it is because we are just not capable of understanding God's righteousness. He quotes a great number of verses, often the same repeatedly, such as "No one comes to me unless the father wills it," and "I have lost none that the father has given me," etc. I noticed that he never quoted such verses as "Do I take any pleasure in the death of the wicked? declares the Sovereign LORD. Rather, am I not pleased when they turn from their ways and live?" or "This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live" or "it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth" or "Does he thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded him? I think not."
He goes beyond just saying that we are saved and justified by Grace, that no one may boast, to implying that we do not meaningfully participate in any part of our salvation (his understanding of our will is that we do "will" ourselves "freely" to follow God once God has changed our will to desire this and then we do so by God's aid) because this participation in our salvation by "denying ourselves and following Him" would give us something (presumably) to boast about. Though many verses can be brought to bear against this position (which also seems incompatible with the concept of "build up for yourselves treasures in heaven") he is eager to maintain that we are incapable of doing good and choosing to do good, or even desiring to do good, and even desiring (much less choosing) to accept God's grace unless God does all of these things for us, because otherwise we would have something to boast about by saying "I renounce the devil and all his works and all of his ways" instead of, presumably, "God has wrought in me the desire to renounce the devil, and He is turning my heart so that I cannot do anything but this". He does not believe, apparently, that it is possible to simply fulfill obligations (for which there is not much glory) by doing good. After all, how can sin be living in opposition to God's will when we are born sinful such that we deserve damnation from the moment of our conception? Indeed, in this view, sin appears to have nothing to do with our actions, such that we are more guilty for doing evil than we were when we were conceived, but rather is the ultimate state of our being. Thus Augustine maintains that God has made all people, some for eternal damnation, some to be saved by His abundant grace, and He has done so because He is just.
Augustine's view evolves out of a few core assumptions. One is that God is righteous and cannot do any unrighteousness. Another is that we cannot understand the ways of God. One is the necessity of Grace in our salvation, which he felt had been threatened by the teachings of Pelagius (who apparently alleged that Grace is given to those who do good works or who prepare themselves for such grace). Another assumption of Augustine's is his own doctrine of Original Sin. An unstated assumption, as well, that is manifestly clear throughout, is that Augustine seems to think that if a human does the minimum of what he is asked to do, it is to that person's glory.
Augustine's view on the predestination of the saints is simply as follows: Due to Adam's sin, we are all born sinful and from the moment we are created, we are created deserving of death as well as eternal conscious torment. This is righteous and just because God cannot do anything unrighteous and just, and if this seems unjust, God's ways are mysterious and difficult to understand. However, because God is loving, God has chosen some people to call to salvation who, because they are called, are unable to refuse the call, while He also neglects to call some others who will be condemned to eternal conscious torment. The condemnation of these unlucky ones, despite having no less merits than those God chooses to save, should make those who are saved feel very thankful to God for His grace to them. Because Augustine asserts that God would be justified in creating an infinite number of souls (who he believes God knits together in the womb) in the corruption of Adam's sin without saving any and condemning all to eternal suffering in hell, it is therefore an unbelievable mercy that even a small number might be given grace and be saved while the rest are destroyed without salvation. It is his view that there is nothing we can do to merit, or choose to accept, this grace when it is bestowed upon us because God is the one who gives us faith and turns our spirit to accept this faith and essentially makes us live in accordance with the faith. Thus, when we do evil, it is merely because God is choosing not to work good in us so that we may be condemned to hell, that His grace to the saved may be manifest to them and they may be even more thankful.
Augustine asserts that it would be wrong to go through his predecessors to look for any that agree with these opinions, because he readily admits that you will find none who hold them. On this point he is correct. He claims, however, that this is because they did not have to deal with questions regarding election in a way that he does, and he assures us that if the ancient writers did have to do so, they would have come to the same conclusion. Here he is either ignorant or lying. It is simply a fact that the theology of Justin Martyr and Clement of Alexandria, to name just two, is explicitly opposed to Augustine's view. On the other hand, I can name a good number of figures who held to a similar view of election as Augustine. They are Valentinian, Marcion, Carpocrates, and the like: namely, almost all of the heretics. In his work "Against Heresies," Irenaeus weakly makes the argument that Herod was allowed to slaughter the infants of Bethlehem so that they would be glorified as the first Christian martyrs. According to Augustine, it would seem that, contrary to this opinion, they were slaughtered to burn in hell eternally so that we might glory more in the mercy that God has given us, and that if Ireneaus were just to think about it harder, he would come to agree with him. If he, and Justin Martyr, and Origen, and Clement of Alexandria, and Tertullian, and Cyprian did not then come to agree, perhaps he would have given them the advice he gives to those who disagree with him in "On Grace and Free Will," which is to simply pray to God that you might be capable of understanding him.
Fundamentally, Augustine's problem is that he cannot see any way that, after being given the gifts of the spirit by grace (such as faith, understanding, self-control, etc.) that we can freely choose to submit to God's will for us without giving us glory that is due to God alone. Therefore, it must all be God's doing and if God's design to not save some while saving others who have done nothing more to deserve salvation is confusing, it is because we are just not capable of understanding God's righteousness. He quotes a great number of verses, often the same repeatedly, such as "No one comes to me unless the father wills it," and "I have lost none that the father has given me," etc. I noticed that he never quoted such verses as "Do I take any pleasure in the death of the wicked? declares the Sovereign LORD. Rather, am I not pleased when they turn from their ways and live?" or "This day I call the heavens and the earth as witnesses against you that I have set before you life and death, blessings and curses. Now choose life, so that you and your children may live" or "it is pleasing in the sight of God our Savior, who desires all people to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth" or "Does he thank that servant because he did the things that were commanded him? I think not."
He goes beyond just saying that we are saved and justified by Grace, that no one may boast, to implying that we do not meaningfully participate in any part of our salvation (his understanding of our will is that we do "will" ourselves "freely" to follow God once God has changed our will to desire this and then we do so by God's aid) because this participation in our salvation by "denying ourselves and following Him" would give us something (presumably) to boast about. Though many verses can be brought to bear against this position (which also seems incompatible with the concept of "build up for yourselves treasures in heaven") he is eager to maintain that we are incapable of doing good and choosing to do good, or even desiring to do good, and even desiring (much less choosing) to accept God's grace unless God does all of these things for us, because otherwise we would have something to boast about by saying "I renounce the devil and all his works and all of his ways" instead of, presumably, "God has wrought in me the desire to renounce the devil, and He is turning my heart so that I cannot do anything but this". He does not believe, apparently, that it is possible to simply fulfill obligations (for which there is not much glory) by doing good. After all, how can sin be living in opposition to God's will when we are born sinful such that we deserve damnation from the moment of our conception? Indeed, in this view, sin appears to have nothing to do with our actions, such that we are more guilty for doing evil than we were when we were conceived, but rather is the ultimate state of our being. Thus Augustine maintains that God has made all people, some for eternal damnation, some to be saved by His abundant grace, and He has done so because He is just.
February 16, 2023
Calvinistic Augustine again. In this work, Augustine basically deals with Arminianism, or at least with the position that God predestines people because he foresees them choosing to believe. Augustine insists that because of our hard hearts, we need God to give us faith.
Augustine deals with his opponents more gently than with Pelagius, and this Christian graciousness in public (however much or little it existed in private) is refreshing.
Augustine points out in this work that he advanced in his thought, thinking first that faith was something we can possess on our own, but by the time of this treatise realizing that it was a gift from God. He cites the same verses as in his treatise on the Free Will and Grace, showing that we have nothing that we have not received.
Since we receive faith because of God's mercy, Augustine interprets Paul's statements on the hardening of Israel as passages showing that the difference between the elect and the non-elect is simply God's decision to elect some and not others. He appeals to Eph. 2:8 and John 6:36, as well as to the ability of believers to pray for unbelievers to be saved (e.g. Rom. 10:1).* The reason God elects some and not others is because none deserves mercy.
He of course relies heavily on Romans to affirm predestination, particularly chapter 11, though with nods to John 15:16 and Ephesians 1. He also points to the verses that show that men's hearts are turned by the Lord, such as 1 Kings 8:57, Ezekiel 11:19, and 36:27.
Augustine then turns to the question of perseverance and says that it is a gift of God to the saints. Encouragingly, he says that we should ask God for the grace to persevere. This is encouraging in the light that Augustine teaches later in the treatise that some believers do not persevere.
There is more here, and it's all pretty interesting (such as "would-he-have-repented" posers), but for me the most valuable thing was seeing Augustine really address the Scriptural questions of predestination and affirming that even faith must of necessity be a gift.
* I suppose you could interpret this as a prayer that God put people in the best possible position to believe. The theological problem then becomes why God has chosen not to put all men in the perfect spot to believe. Arminians cannot answer this, because the whole point is that God does everything he can to allow people to be saved.
Augustine deals with his opponents more gently than with Pelagius, and this Christian graciousness in public (however much or little it existed in private) is refreshing.
Augustine points out in this work that he advanced in his thought, thinking first that faith was something we can possess on our own, but by the time of this treatise realizing that it was a gift from God. He cites the same verses as in his treatise on the Free Will and Grace, showing that we have nothing that we have not received.
Since we receive faith because of God's mercy, Augustine interprets Paul's statements on the hardening of Israel as passages showing that the difference between the elect and the non-elect is simply God's decision to elect some and not others. He appeals to Eph. 2:8 and John 6:36, as well as to the ability of believers to pray for unbelievers to be saved (e.g. Rom. 10:1).* The reason God elects some and not others is because none deserves mercy.
He of course relies heavily on Romans to affirm predestination, particularly chapter 11, though with nods to John 15:16 and Ephesians 1. He also points to the verses that show that men's hearts are turned by the Lord, such as 1 Kings 8:57, Ezekiel 11:19, and 36:27.
Augustine then turns to the question of perseverance and says that it is a gift of God to the saints. Encouragingly, he says that we should ask God for the grace to persevere. This is encouraging in the light that Augustine teaches later in the treatise that some believers do not persevere.
There is more here, and it's all pretty interesting (such as "would-he-have-repented" posers), but for me the most valuable thing was seeing Augustine really address the Scriptural questions of predestination and affirming that even faith must of necessity be a gift.
* I suppose you could interpret this as a prayer that God put people in the best possible position to believe. The theological problem then becomes why God has chosen not to put all men in the perfect spot to believe. Arminians cannot answer this, because the whole point is that God does everything he can to allow people to be saved.
February 1, 2023
I agree with the contents of the book so far as I understand. But this book is a challenging book to read. Augustine isn't as easy to read here as he is in Confessions, but it's a beneficial read. It's possible that my discipline for reading him (especially since I did so online) contributed to this, but it was quite hard to keep focused.
I appreciate that he responded to the Massalians (Semi-Pelagians/Semi-Augustinians) and was interested in his position of them being brothers in the faith.
I appreciate that he responded to the Massalians (Semi-Pelagians/Semi-Augustinians) and was interested in his position of them being brothers in the faith.
August 12, 2020
Overall, this was a pretty good book, although somewhat dense and hard to read at times? I don’t have a lot of cultural context for this book, and I think that would have probably informed a lot of the arguments he was making. There was one section of the book that really confused me but I’m interested in looking into it more. Still, some good content and good quotes, although I didn’t dig into it very deeply and would probably benefit from doing it at some point in the future.
March 30, 2024
Augustine is a valuable scholar of the Scriptures that no Christian should pass over. I strongly disagree with Augustine's theology of double predestination presented in this treatise and find it entirely unconvincing, even internally logically inconsistent, but it is still edifying.
May 14, 2018
Eye opening
I had to read this for a class. He cleared up some confusion for me on a few scriptures that I've not been clear on
I had to read this for a class. He cleared up some confusion for me on a few scriptures that I've not been clear on
January 30, 2023
Some of the same strengths and weaknesses of the last few works.
September 13, 2023
The thesis is good but the execution didn't do it for me
September 22, 2023
Not sure if I agree or disagree, but I felt it necessary to read and further my knowledge.
December 3, 2024
Nepārliecina.
August 27, 2025
Great foundation for the doctrine of election! His word choice and explanation is particularly helpful.
September 15, 2016
Very clear and concise.
March 8, 2021
Not the most readable translation I’ve encountered, but still helpful nonetheless.
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