Read City of God (Penguin Classics) Online
Authors: Saint Augustine
24.
The meaning of the Lord’s saying, ‘their days will be a hundred and twenty years’
To pass to God’s saying that ‘their days will be a hundred and twenty years’
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this is not to be taken as foretelling that after this men would not exceed 120 years, since we find that after the Flood, as well as before, men surpassed even 500 years. We must realize that God Said this when Noah had nearly completed 500 years, that is, he was in his 480th year, which is called the 500th year in Scripture, in accordance with its general practice of using round numbers for a total only slightly less. Now we know the Flood happened in the 600th year of Noah’s life,
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in the second month, and thus the prediction meant that men who were going to perish would live a hundred and twenty years more, and at the end of that period they would be wiped out by the Flood.
It is a well-founded belief that the Flood happened at a time when there were no longer to be found on earth any beings who did not deserve such a death as served to punish the wicked. Not that a death of this kind can affect good men – who are destined to the at some time – in any way that could harm them after death; nevertheless none of those who, according to the scriptural account, were descended from the seed of Seth, did in fact perish in the Flood. For the divinely inspired narrative gives the cause of the Flood as follows:
The Lord God saw that the wickedness of mankind had multiplied on the earth, and that everyone was carefully planning evil in his heart throughout his life. And God considered his creation of man on the earth: and he reconsidered, and said: ‘I will wipe off man, whom I created, from the face of the earth, and all creatures, from man to beast, from creeping things to birds of the air; because I am angry at having created them.’
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25.
God’s anger does not disturb his changeless tranquillity
Now God’s anger is not an agitation of his mind; it is a judgement by which punishment is inflicted on sin. And his consideration and reconsideration are his unchanging plan applied to things subject to change. For God does not repent of any action of his,
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as man does,
and his decision on any matter whatsoever is as fixed as his foreknowledge is sure. But if Scripture did not employ such words, it would not strike home so closely, as it were, to all mankind. For Scripture is concerned for man, and it uses such language to terrify the proud, to arouse the careless, to exercise the inquirer, and to nourish the intelligent; and it would not have this effect if it did not first bend down and, as we may say, descend to the level of those on the ground. When it goes on to announce the annihilation of all living creatures on earth and in the air, it is proclaiming the magnitude of the coming disaster. It is not threatening the destruction of creatures bereft of reason, as if they too had sinned.
26.
Noah’s ark as a symbol of Christ and the Church
We now pass on to Noah. He was a righteous man and, according to the truthful witness of Scripture, he was ‘perfect in his generation’.
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That is, he was perfect, not as the citizens of the City of God are to be made perfect in the immortal condition in which they will become equal to the angels of God, but as they can be perfect during their pilgrimage on earth. It was to Noah that God gave instructions to make an ark in which he was to be rescued from the devastation of the Flood, together with his family, that is, his wife, his sons and daughters-in-law, and also the animals that went into the ark in accordance with God’s directions. Without doubt this is a symbol of the City of God on pilgrimage in this world, of the Church which is saved through the wood on which was suspended ‘the mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus’.
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The actual measurements of the ark, its length, height and breadth, symbolize the human body, in the reality of which Christ was to come, and did come, to mankind. For the length of the human body from the top of the head to the sole of the foot is six times its breadth from side to side, and ten times its depth, measured on the side from back to belly. I mean that if you have a man lying on his back or on his face, and measure him, his length from head to foot is six times his breadth from right to left, or from left to right, and ten times his alti tude from the ground. That is why the ark was made 300 cubits in length, fifty cubits in breadth, and thirty in height. And the door which it was given in its side surely represents the wound made when the side of the crucified was pierced with the spear.
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This, as we know, is the way of entrance for those who come to him, because from
that wound flowed the sacraments with which believers are initiated. And the order for squared beams in the ark’s construction refers symbolically to the life of the saints which is stable on every side; for in whatever direction you turn a squared object, it will remain stable. All the other details mentioned in the construction of the ark are symbols of realities found in the Church.
But it would be tedious to work all this out in detail; and, in any case, I have done this aheatly in my work Against
Faustus
the Mani-chea,
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who denied that anything was prophesied about Christ in the books of the Hebrews. Besides, there is certainly a possibility that someone may explain these points more adequately than I can, or one man than another. That does not matter, provided that all that is said has reference to the City of God, which is our subject, the City which is on pilgrimage in this wicked world as though in a flood. This reference must be observed, if the commentator does not wish to stray widely from the sense intended by the writer of this narrative.
It may be, for example, that someone will prefer a different interpretation to the one that I have given in the above-mentioned work of this passage, ‘You will make it with lower, second, and third storeys.’
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I suggested
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that the Church is said to have two storeys because it is assembled from all nations, having two classes of men, the circumcised and the uncircumcised, or, as the Apostle puts it in another way, Jews and Greeks;
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and that it is called three-storeyed because all nations were re-established after the Flood from the three sons of Noah. But my critic must suggest some other interpretation which is not at variance with the Rule of Faith.
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For instance, God wanted the ark to have living-quarters not only on the lowest level but on the higher level (which he called the second storey) and on the level above that (the third storey) so that a dwelling-place should rise up, the third from the bottom upwards. Now this could be interpreted as illustrating the three virtues extolled by the Apostle: faith, hope, and charity.
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Again, three storeys could be much more appropriately explained as standing for the three abundant harvests in the Gospel, ‘thirty fold, sixty fold, and a hundred fold’.
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Married chastity, on this interpretation, would inhabit the lowest level, widowed chastity the floor above, and virginal purity the top storey. And there may be other explanations and better ones, that could be advanced, which would be in harmony with the faith of this City. I would be
prepared to say the same about all the other interpretations which can be put forward on this topic. Different suggestions may be made; but they must be checked by the standard of the harmonious unity of the Catholic faith.
27.
The account of the Flood is neither merely historical nor purely allegorical
No one ought to imagine, however, that this account was written for no purpose, or that we are to look here solely for a reliable historical record without any allegorical meaning, or, conversely, that those events are entirely unhistorical, and the language purely symbolical, or that, whatever may be the nature of the story it has no connection with prophecy about the Church. Surely it is only a twisted mind that would maintain that books which have been so scrupulously preserved for thousands of years, which have been safeguarded by such a concern for so well-ordered a transmission, that such books were written without serious purpose, or that we should consult them simply for historical facts? For, to take one point only, if it was the large number of animals that compelled the building of an ark of such great size, why was it necessary to embark two of each unclean species, and seven of each clean kind? Both clean and unclean could have been preserved by the same number. Or are we really to suppose that God, who ordered their preservation so as to renew their species, had not the power to re-create them in the same way as he had first created them?
Now there are those who maintain that the account of the Flood is not historical, but is simply a collection of symbols and allegories. They maintain, in the first place, that it is impossible for so vast a flood to have happened that the water rose to the level of fifteen cubits above the highest mountains, their evidence being the alleged fact that clouds cannot gather above the top of Mount Olympus, because the atmosphere there is already so high that the denser air is lacking, in which winds, clouds, and rains originate. It escapes their notice that earth, the densest of all elements, could exist there. Or are they going to deny that the summit of a mountain is formed of earth? If not, why do they admit that earth is allowed to reach such high levels in the atmosphere, and yet maintain that the same possibility is not open to the waters? And yet those who measure and weigh the elements inform us that water rises higher and weighs less than earth. What rational argument then do they put forward to explain why earth, a
heavier and lower element, should have intruded into the region of the serener atmosphere during the revolutions of so many years, if water, a lighter and higher element, has not been permitted to do so even for an inconsiderable time?
It is also said that an ark of the dimensions described could not have contained so many species of animals of both sexes, two of each species of the unclean, and seven of each of the clean. They appear to reckon only 300 cubits in length, and fifty in width, without taking into account that there is an equal amount of space on the higher and on the highest level, so that the measurements are multiplied by three, making 900 cubits by 150. We may also bear in mind the clever suggestion contributed by Origen. He points out
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that Moses, ‘the man of God’, was, according to the Scriptures, ‘versed in all the learning of the Egyptians’,
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who were addicted to geometry, and therefore Moses may have meant geometrical cubits, one of which is alleged to equal six of ours. If that suggestion were adopted it would be clear to anyone that an ark of such size would have an immense capacity.
As for the argument that an ark of such enormous size could not have been constructed, this is a misrepresentation, and a most unconvincing one. For they know that immense cities have been built, and they fail to notice the hundred years that were spent in the fabrication of that ark. Now if it is possible for stones to adhere together, cemented merely by lime, to make an encircling wall so many miles long, are we to suppose it impossible that timbers should be joined together by pegs, bolts, nails and bituminous glue, to frame an ark extending in length and breadth in straight, not curved lines? This ark would not require launching into the sea by human effort, but would be raised by the water, when it arrived, owing to the natural difference in specific gravity; and it would be steered by divine providence when it was afloat, instead of by human vigilance, to keep it from shipwreck wherever it went.
Then there is a problem constantly suggested by excessively minute criticism. It concerns the tiniest creatures, not only such creatures as mice and newts, but also such as locusts, beetles, and even flies and fleas; and the question raised is whether they could not have been present in the ark in greater numbers than the limit set when God gave the command. We must begin by pointing out to those who are puzzled on this point that the words, ‘the things which crawl on the earth’
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are to be taken as meaning that it was not necessary to
preserve in the ark the creatures able to live in the waters; and this would include besides the fishes and other submerged creatures, those that swim on the surface, for instance, many of the birds. Again, the words, ‘they shall be male and female’
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are surely to be understood as referring to the need to renew the species, and so it was not necessary to have in the ark those creatures which can be produced without sexual intercourse from various substances, or from the decomposition of substances. Or if they were there in the ark, as they are generally present in houses, they could have been there without the fixing of a definite number. On the other hand, a mystery of the highest solemnity was being enacted here, a symbolic presentation of a reality of the greatest importance; and it may be that it could not be adequately conveyed by the historical event unless all the creatures which were unable, through natural limitations, to maintain life in the waters, were there in the ark in that fixed number. If so, this was not the responsibility of any particular man or men, but of God. In fact, Noah did not catch the animals and then put them in, he let them in as they came and entered. That is the force of the words ‘they will come in to you’;
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not, to be sure, through man’s driving, but at God’s bidding. But there is this exception: we are surely not to suppose that sexless creatures were included, since it was definitely laid down that ‘they shall be male and female.’
There are, we know, some animals which are produced from various substances without sexual intercourse, but afterwards reproduce by intercourse; flies are an example of this. There are others, such as bees, which have no distinction of male and female. Then again, there are animals which show sexual characteristics without producing offspring, such as male and female mules. It would be surprising if they were in the ark. Instead, it would be enough to have their parents there, that is, the species of horse and ass. And the same is true of any other animals which produce some different kind of creature by interbreeding. But if such hybrids had anything to contribute to the allegorical meaning of the ark, then they were included, for such a species also has male and female.
Some people are puzzled about the kinds of food that would have been available in the ark for animals which are supposed to be purely carnivorous. They speculate whether there were animals taken on in excess of the prescribed number, without transgressing the command, since their inclusion would have been compelled by the need to feed the others, or whether (and this is the more plausible solution) there
could have been some foodstuffs other than meat which were suitable for all animals. We know, in fact, that many carnivorous animals feed on vegetables and fruit, especially figs and chestnuts. Thus it would not be surprising if that wise and righteous man was also instructed by God about the appropriate food for each species and prepared a store of meatless food adapted for the various animals.
Is there anything which we would refuse to eat under the compulsion of hunger? Is there anything that God could not render agreeable and wholesome? He could indeed have endowed these creatures with the ability to live without food – this would have been easy for his divine power – had it not been that their eating played its part in completing the allegorical representation of so great a mystery. In fact, only a love of disputation would allow anyone to contend that the elaborate details of the historical narrative are not symbols designed to give a prophetic picture of the Church. For nations have already filled the Church, and the clean and the unclean are contained as it were in the framework of the Church’s unity, until the appointed end is reached. The meaning is so abundantly clear on this particular point, that we must never think of doubting that the other details have their own meanings, although the language is rather more obscure and the references less easy to recognize.
This being so, no one, however stubborn, will venture to imagine that this narrative was written without an ulterior purpose; and it could not plausibly be said that the events, though historical, have no symbolic meaning, or that the account is not factual, but merely symbolical, or that the symbolism has nothing to do with the Church. No; we must believe that the writing of this historical record had a wise purpose, that the events are historical, that they have a symbolic meaning, and that this meaning gives a prophetic picture of the Church.
Now that this book has arrived at this point, I must bring it to a close. My next task will be to examine the development of both cities, that is, of the earthly city, which lives by man’s standards, and of the Heavenly City, which lives according to God’s will, in the period following the Flood, and thereafter in the following periods of history.