Key Arguments

• Augustine recounts that his friend, whom he had led into Manichaeism, fell gravely ill and was baptized while unconscious: ‘when his life was despaired of, he was baptized without his knowing it. To me this was a matter of no interest.’
• He assumed his own prior teaching would outweigh the sacrament: ‘I assumed that his soul would retain what it had received from me, not what had happened to his body while he was unconscious. But it turned out quite differently.’
• Upon recovery, the friend strongly repudiated Augustine’s mockery of his baptism: ‘He was horrified at me as if I were an enemy, and with amazing and immediate frankness advised me that, if I wished to be his friend, I must stop saying this kind of thing to him.’
• Soon afterward, the friend died; Augustine interprets this as God snatching him away from Augustine’s ‘lunacy’ for safekeeping: ‘But he was snatched away from my lunacy, so that he might be preserved with you for my consolation.’
• Augustine’s subsequent grief (‘Grief darkened my heart’) and inability to tell his soul to trust God because his God was ‘the [Manichee] phantom’ shows how his false theology left him without consolation and contributed to his crisis.

Source Quotes

11: 33)! When he was sick with fever, for a long time he lay unconscious in a mortal sweat, and when his life was despaired of, he was baptized without his knowing it. To me this was a matter of no interest.9 I assumed that his soul would retain what it had received from me, not what had happened to his body while he was unconscious. But it turned out quite differently.

When he was sick with fever, for a long time he lay unconscious in a mortal sweat, and when his life was despaired of, he was baptized without his knowing it. To me this was a matter of no interest.9 I assumed that his soul would retain what it had received from me, not what had happened to his body while he was unconscious. But it turned out quite differently. For he recovered and was restored to health, and at once, as soon as I could speak with him (and I was able to do so as soon as he could speak, since I never left his side, and we were deeply dependent on one another), I attempted to joke with him, imagining that he too would laugh with me about the baptism which he had received when far away in mind and sense.

But he had already learnt that he had received the sacrament. He was horrified at me as if I were an enemy, and with amazing and immediate frankness advised me that, if I wished to be his friend, I must stop saying this kind of thing to him. I was dumbfounded and perturbed; but I deferred telling him of all my feelings until he should get better and recover his health and strength.

Then I would be able to do what I wished with him. But he was snatched away from my lunacy, so that he might be preserved with you for my consolation. After a few days, while I was absent, the fever returned, and he died.

After a few days, while I was absent, the fever returned, and he died. (9) ‘Grief darkened my heart’ (Lam. 5: 17). Everything on which I set my gaze was death.

Key Concepts

• when his life was despaired of, he was baptized without his knowing it. To me this was a matter of no interest.
• I assumed that his soul would retain what it had received from me, not what had happened to his body while he was unconscious. But it turned out quite differently.
• He was horrified at me as if I were an enemy, and with amazing and immediate frankness advised me that, if I wished to be his friend, I must stop saying this kind of thing to him.
• But he was snatched away from my lunacy, so that he might be preserved with you for my consolation.
• ‘Grief darkened my heart’ (Lam. 5: 17).

Context

Book IV, section iv (7–8): Augustine interprets his friend’s baptism and death within a providential framework that highlights God’s overriding grace and his own distorted love and theology.