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Augustine Free Will Analysis

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When Augustine penned his confessions he never could have predicted the sort world he was opening to people everywhere. With his writings, Augustine developed questions and answers related to theology that scholars continue to debate hundreds of years after his death. Perhaps one of the most salient topics involves the nature of God and His relation with the world, especially in terms of free will. If one joins the writings of Augustine another great writer Paul, formerly Saul of Tarsus, he can then seemingly reveal the truth. It seems a divine being must allow agency amongst mortal men otherwise their choices mean nothing.
One of the most important facets of Christianity lies in choice. Whether choosing to sin, or choosing to believe something, what someone chooses plays a major role in life. Perhaps the most important of all is the choice to convert. Paul writes that people must “confess with [their] lips that Jesus is lord and believe in [their] …show more content…

Assuming that God would not have infinite knowledge leads to the famous God and the rock paradox. If there was anything of which God had no knowledge of then God would not be all powerful, and thus, God would be limited. Therefore God must have infinite wisdom, a wisdom Augustine describes as “the wisdom that governs the world” (St. Augustine’s Confessions VII.8). It could be said that God has knowledge of all possible outcomes but that it is ultimately up to the choice of men as to what outcome comes about. But even to make such a claim would be limiting God. After all, God “is always the same, and you always know unchangeably the things which are not always the same” (Confessions VIII.6). While this allows the possibility for the argument that God has a knowledge of what can be, this still does not make up for the fact that it limits God. Any limitation, in any capacity, diminishes the entire aspect of being God. Thus, it appears that there is no real

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