Slaves of God : Augustine and Other Romans on Religion and Politics - Toni Alimi

Slaves of God

Augustine and Other Romans on Religion and Politics

By: Toni Alimi

Hardcover | 6 August 2024

At a Glance

Hardcover


$67.25

or 4 interest-free payments of $16.81 with

 or 

Aims to ship in 15 to 25 business days

When will this arrive by?
Enter delivery postcode to estimate

A provocative look at the central role of slavery in Augustine’s religious, ethical, and political thought

Augustine believed that slavery is permissible, but to understand why, we must situate him in his late antique Roman intellectual context. Slaves of God provides a major reassessment of this monumental figure in the Western religious and political tradition, tracing the remarkably close connections between Augustine’s understanding of slavery and his broader thought.

Augustine is most often read through the lens of Greek philosophy and the theology of Christian writers such as Paul and Ambrose, yet his debt to Roman thought is seldom appreciated. Toni Alimi reminds us that the author of Confessions and City of God was also a Roman citizen and argues that some of the thinkers who most significantly shaped his intellectual development were Romans such as Cicero, Seneca, Lactantius, and Varro—Romans who had much to say about slavery and its relationship to civic life. Alimi shows how Augustine, a keen and influential student of these figures, related chattel slavery and slavery to God, and sheds light on Augustinianism’s complicity in Christianity’s long entanglement with slavery.

An illuminating work of scholarship, Slaves of God reveals how slavery was integral to Augustine’s views about law, rule, accountability, and citizenship, and breaks new ground on the topic of slavery in late antique and medieval political thought.

More in Slavery & Abolition of Slavery

Women, Race & Class : Penguin Modern Classics - Angela Y. Davis
Let Us Descend : An Oprah's Book Club Pick - Jesmyn Ward

RRP $32.99

$27.95

15%
OFF
The Patriarchs : How Men Came to Rule - Angela Saini

RRP $34.99

$31.75

Mason-Dixon : Crucible of the Nation - Edward G. Gray

RRP $61.95

$42.25

32%
OFF
Harriet Tubman: Live in Concert : A Novel - Bob the Drag Queen
Kidnapped at Sea : The Civil War Voyage of David Henry White - Andrew Sillen
Dominoes - Phoebe McIntosh

Paperback

RRP $22.99

$22.90