Ray Ellis’s Reviews > On Genesis: Two Books on Genesis Against the Manichees and on the Literal Interpretation of Genesis : An Unfinished Book > Status Update

Literal Meaning of Genesis - Indices

Literal Meaning of Genesis chs.10-16 - Gen 1:9-26 - Last few paragraphs written years later to create some sort of conclusion, but book essentially left unfinished, to be completely rewritten decades later.

Literal Meaning of Genesis chs.1-9 - Gen 1:1-8 - Covers similar ground to Against Manichees since written around the same time. But more philosophical and less assertive of one view.

On Genesis book 2 Chs.14-29 (end) - Gen 3 - For most of the exegesis Augustine seems to forget about the Manichees. There is no concept of original sin here yet. At this early stage Augustine seems to believe that we each individually repeat the sins of the first humans. Most of the chapters are exegetical. But the last few go back and view the text symbolically. He also again directly critiques the Manichees here.

Book 2 ch.1-13 (Gen 2:4-25) - The 'day' of v.4 is the eternal day. The whole of time and space are created on that 'day.' Mostly though Augustine views Genesis 2-3 and most of the OT as having symbolic meaning in pointing to Christ, in keeping with his reading of several NT texts which imply for him that view.

Book 1 ch.10-25(end) (Gen 1:5b-2:3) - Struggles with the idea of multiplying in v.28 as it precedes sin (so sex is seemingly the result of sin). So Augustine views it symbolically. Also, having discussed the text in its literal meaning, the final two chapters reflect on a symbolic meaning.

Book 1 - Chapters 1-9 - Gen 1:1-5a - Argument for God being timeless. Created a formless universe first then constructed the known universe from that stuff. Manichees accept the NT but reject the OT, so Augustine argues from the NT.

Introduction: Significance and Retractions - These are early works on Genesis, which are much more fully developed in Augustine's later Literal Meaning from around 410AD. In particular the first two books are just focussed on the objections from the Manichees.